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COPYRIGHT DEPOSIT. 



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THE 



MIDDLE AGES 



REVISITED 



OR 



THE ROMAN GOVERNMENT AND RELIGION 

AND THEIR RELATIONS TO 

BRITAIN. 
\ 



BY 
/ 

ALEX. DEL MAR 



NEW YORK 
PUBLISHED BY THE CAMBRIDGE ENCYCLOPEDIA CO. 

62 Reade Street 
1900 

{All rights reserved) 



'TWO COPIES He:«.;t.i v j^jD, 

Library or Cf&ngretfb 

m^'-^ 1909 

Keglstsr of Copyrighifb 



5Gvri.i 



COPYRIGHT 
BY ALEX. DEL MAR 
1899. 



SECOND COPY, 



THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED 

OR 

THE ROMAN GOVERNMENT AND RELIGION 

AND THEIR RELATIONS TO 

BRITAIN. 



CHAPTERS. 



PAGE. 

Preface, . . ix 

Bibliography, xi 

I. — Ancient Astronomy, Astrology, and Religion, . i 

II. — Eastern and Western Incarnations, .... 8 

III. — The Worship of C^sar, ........ 26 

IV. — Defective Theories of the Feudal System, . 58 

V. — Hierarchical Origin of Feudalism, .... 77 

VI. — First Institutes of the Sacerdotal Empire, . 99 

VII. — Other Institutes of the Sacerdotal Empire, 119 

VIII. — Christianization of the Roman Institutes, . 143 

IX. — Rise of the Medieval Empire, 166 

X. — The Lost Treaty of Seltz, 192 

XI. — Constitution of the Medieval Empire, . . . 203 

XII. — Destruction of the Sacerdotal Empire, . . 238 

XIII. GUELF AND GhIBELLINE WaRS, 249 

XIV. — England a Province of the Empire, . . 253 

XV. — The Sacerdotal Character of Gold, . . 273 

XVI. — Clues Derived from the jT^. s. d. System, . 295 

XVII. — Vassalian Position of the Anglo-Normans, 308 

XVIII. — Eariest Exercise of certain Regalian Rights, . 314 

XIX. — Gradual Developement of English Nationality, 332 

XX. — Vassal Kings of England, 347 

XXI. — Birth of the Independent Monarchy, . . . 353 

Index, 367 

Appendices, 371 

Corrigenda, 371 



PREFACE. 



V, 



The Roman government and religion and their relations to Britain 
are themes upon which there cannot be thrown too much light. The 
Constitution of the old Empire,thechristianizationof itsinstitutes,and 
the position of the medieval empire and the provinces, until the lat- 
ter became independent kingdoms, is not only the Key to all modern 
history, it has its practical importance and conveys its lessons for the 
future. What if it can be shown that John was only among the last 
of a long line of vassal kings who bowed the knee to Rome and sad- 
dled upon the people of Britain a responsibility for institutes which 
they had no hand in framing and which were utterly opposed to their 
racial aptitudes and tendencies ? 

In weighing the evidences which throw light upon these questions 
the author was compelled to trace the ancient systems of mythology 
and religion. He would gladly have avoided a subject of so much 
contention, but this was found impracticable. Society is to some ex- 
tent the product of accepted history, while such history is to some 
extent the product of religious belief. To appreciate the spirit of the 
laws under which we live and must act, it is necessary to follow the 
evolution of religious systems. We have entered the arcana of the 
Sacred College not to profane its mysteries, but to fill our pitchers at 
its holy fount. 

When civil strife had so much exhausted the Romans that they were 
unable to prevent the overthrow of their republican institutes or re- 
sist the erection of the Hierarchy, they accepted from their tyrants 
a form of religion so impious and degrading as to speedily disgust 
the better classes of citizens and turn them against a government in 
whose establishment they had formerly taken an active and patriotic 
part. This feeling found popular echo in distant provinces, like Judea 
and Britain, and it led to those frequent insurrections which distin- 
guished the first century of our sera. The religion which led to these 
insurrections was the worship of Caesar as the Creator. This is the 



X PREFACE. 

pivot upon which turned the history of the Roman world for many 
centuries; yet only the faintest allusions to it will be found in our 
standard works of reference. In the present treatise the subject will 
be brought into relief. It will then be perceived that the true grandeur 
of Christianity and the moral lessons of its conquest over paganism, 
have been hid from sight by a false history of the Roman religion and 
its developement. No greater struggle has ever been fought, and none 
so belittled by petty conceits and fables. Not only this, but if the 
edifice by which the aims of civilization are supported continues to 
be poised upon the flimsy foundations which the medieval monks con- 
structed, it is exposed to the risk of falling beneath the blows that 
criticism and satire may reserve for its more vulnerable elements. 

The accepted origin and spirit of the feudal system will also be chal- 
lenged. It is in vain that the constitutions of certain modern states 
have forbidden feudalism, so long as the essential nature of feuds is 
misunderstood, or their origin is overlooked. Feudalism is not yet 
wholly extirpated from the European world. It has been cut down in 
some states, it has been removed from tenures of land in others; but 
its seeds survive, and it may flourish again. So too are the rights of 
assemblage, aye, even of religious liberty, jeopardized, so long as we 
remain but imperfectly acquainted with their historical developement 
and the means by which they have been and therefore may again be 
subverted. 

Even after these subjects are rightly determined the hierarchical 
version of Roman history will be found protected by formidable de- 
fences. Not merely literature, but the fine arts have been largely 
employed in its support. Painting, sculpture, the drama, music, and 
architecture, all sprang up within the sacerdotal enclosure and in a 
certain sense they all belong to it still. The medieval and modern works 
of art which perpetuate the ecclesiastical myths of antiquity are to 
be numbered by the million and are scattered broadcast; those which 
refute them are few and but little known. A wholesome and purer 
catholicity demands that the employment of these methods in re- 
ligious systems should be discouraged ; and that the arts shall be left 
free to enjoy the advantages of secular encouragement and develope- 
ment. 



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THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 



CHAPTER I. 

ANCIENT ASTRONOMY, ASTROLOGY AND RELIGION. 

The key to the Middle Ages is the history of the Ancient Empire — The corner- 
stone of the Empire was the Worship of Augustus as Divus Filius — Oriental origin 
of the Messianic Theory — The Ecliptical Cycle — Ten Months' Year — Incarnations of 
Vishnu — Movement of this Mythos westward to Babylonia, Egypt, Greece and Rome — 
Use made of it by the Romans — Pretensions of Titus, Sertorius, Pompey, Caesar and 
Octavius. 

THE history of the Middle Ages was evolved from that of the 
Empire. The corner-stone of the Empire was the worship of 
Octavius Caesar as the Son of God, Divus Filius. Augustus was wor- 
shipped not as a hero or demi-god, but as a Messiah, an incarnation 
of the Deity, born of the Heavenly Father and an earthly mother; 
sent on earth in a miraculous manner, at a sacred period, and in pur- 
suance of a heavenly design; which was to bring peace on earth, heal 
the wounds and inequities of the past, restore the Golden Age to 
Latium and fulfill the prophecies of the Cumsean Sibyl. These tokens 
identified him with all the Messiahs who descended from the Indian 
incarnation mythos and who consequently were due to appear on 
earth according to our present chronology in the yearB. C. 6^, which 
was the year of les Chrishna, Salivahana, Ptolemy IX. , Woden, Hesus 
and numerous other Sons of God, whether impersonated by living men 
or not. 

Said Tacitus, himself a priest and member of the Quindecemviral 
College: " The reverence due to the gods was no longer exclusive. 
Augustus claimed equal worship. Temples were built and statues 
were erected to him; a mortal man was adored; and priests and pon- 
tiffs were appointed to pay him impious homage." 

In Gibbon's time the Oriental evidence which leads up to, invites 
and explains the worship of the Messiah, was lacking. In fact, such 
evidence only came to light after the British conquest of India, and 



2 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

much of it has only been translated into European languages within 
the last half century. 

The extent to which the Latin Sacred College has antedated, mis- 
attributed, altered, or perverted the literary remains of Rome, was 
not commonly suspected, or if suspected, as it was by many eminent 
persons, the suspicion could not be substantiated, for want of posi- 
tive and convincing evidences. Such evidences are now supplied by 
the epigraphic monuments and coins which have been dug up chiefly 
within the last thirty or forty years. These evidences not only con- 
vict the College of innumerable forgeries, they prove that even the 
Calendar has been altered and a vast number of dates thrown into 
confusion, merely to make room for false dates and imaginary events. 

This charge is not made lightly. In the chronological work cited 
below, (p. 3,) are contained the proofs that Augustus, in order to sup- 
port his claims to divinity and make good his pretence of being that 
Son of God whose advent had been predicted in the sacred books both 
of the Orient and Occident, sank 78 years from the sra of Rome, which 
he reduced from 816 to 738 years before what is now known as the 
Christian asra. The same work also contains the proofs that in a long 
subsequent age the Latin Sacred College, following the evil example 
of Augustus, and with a like deceptive object, added 15 years to the 
ancient calendar of Rome, thus removing the Foundation, or Year of 
the City, to B. C. 753, where it now falsely stands. This double altera- 
tion has rendered the chronology of Rome 6;^ years wrong; more- 
over, it is precisely to this extent that it differs from the chronology 
of the Orient. The proofs referred to are so valid, so numerous, so 
mutually corroborative and so convincing, that to refuse assent to them 
would be to defy the laws of evidence and degrade the science of his- 
tory to the level of medieval hagiology. 

Whatever reasons deterred The Historian of Rome from exam- 
ining and elucidating the remarkable passage above quoted from 
Tacitus, the fact remains that it has not been elucidated. Within 
the last quarter of a century several very elaborate works have been 
written on the worship of Augustus; but while they fully prove the 
manner and extent of this worship, they omit to explain its origin 
and fail to trace its consequences. A religion which was shared by 
over one hundred millions of the most civilized people in the world, 
many of whom fiercely contested the honor of erecting its temples or 
otherwise demonstrating their devotion to it, must have had both a 
paternity and a progeny; it must have originated in circumstances of 
widespread belief; it must have ended in circumstances of universal 



ANCIENT ASTRONOMY, ASTROLOGY AND RELIGION. 3 

disbelief; it must have left behind it sequellae that covered centuries 
of time and affected every part of the Roman Empire. All these 
circumstances are disregarded by the chroniclers of the Augustan 
cult. It will be the aim of the present work to supply what they 
have omitted. 

In searching for the origin of an Idea, the explorer must be trebly 
equipped ; he should start with an arsenal of information ; he should 
be prepared to find that, like a River which is fed by numerous 
streams, the object of his search has not one origin but many origins; 
he should be satisfied if he is able to discover that a single one of 
these streams is navigable. In the author's work on "The Messiah" 
he has fixed the seras of more than two hundred so-called incarna- 
tions of the Deity, of which about one-half were assumptions of di- 
vine origin on the part of real historical personages, while the remainder 
were mythical incarnations of ideal personages; the latter being of 
course always the inventions of ages long subsequent to the seras as- 
signed to them, and therefore anachronical. An attentive examina- 
tion of the details, real or fabulous, relating to these personages, 
will hardly fail to leave the impression that one class of them were 
the offspring of the other; in other words, that the mythical incarna- 
tions were in most cases reactions against the historical pretenders; 
in short, that man has ever sought a refuge from the tyranny and 
exactions of earthly deities in the creation of imaginary beings, whose 
attributes fitted what was at the time his measure of Perfection. 
This is a mental process which we begin in childhood ; it is one which 
we shall always practice; the only change that will ever occur in its 
operation will be the shifting of its centre; our Ideal will not always 
be the same. 

The creation of ideal Messiahs and their acceptance by the people, 
are two very differenf things. The former is within the power of any 
individual; the latter requires the aid of popular superstition; and 
this in turn must have a basis, be it ever so small, of physical truth, 
obvious to the senses and placed beyond question. 

There can be little doubt that the messianic theory originated in 
India, where it developed, probably before the Mahabharata wars, 
into the ten incarnations of les-nu, or Vishnu. The theory was that 
at each annualized revolution of the moon's node, or more precisely, 
at each annualized or solarised ecliptical cycle, the entire system of 
the universe was renewed, the same celestial movements recurred 
and a new ara was begun. This ffirawas marked by the appearance 
on earth of Brahma, or les-nu, the Creator, in a new form, or avatar. 



4 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED, 

It was believed that at the end of ten such manifestations, the celes- 
tial system would run its entire course, the earth would be destroyed 
and mankind would be brought to final judgment. A relic of this 
theory till survives in the Persian, Jewish, Greek and Roman mun- 
dane 3eras, all of which can be traced to the 6585 years which the 
Indians accorded to the ten incarnations of les-nu and termed the 
Earth's Journey. 

This interval had an astronomical basis with an astrological exten- 
sion. In order to understand its origin, it must be premised that at 
the period when the extension was adopted, that is to say, some time 
between the Mahabharata wars and the alleged advent of Gotama, 
the zodiacal circle was divided into ;^6 decans each of ten parts; the 
civil year consisted of ten months each of ^6 days, with five epago- 
menae; and the number of incarnations, demi-gods, patriarchs, tribes, 
institutes, commandments, prytanies, judices, etc., was always ten. 
Such was the case in India and in all the countries which derived 
their civilization from India. Hence in the various astrological de- 
ductions which the ancients made from their astronomical knowledge, 
the divisor or multiplier, as the case might be, was as commonly ten 
as now it is 12. 

The astronomical basis of the Earth's Journey was the 65857^ days 
of the ecliptical cycle. This cycle not only comprised the whole 
round of eclipses; it also renewed all the lunar festivals on the same 
days of the 36-day month. It was therefore the Metonic cycle, so 
to speak, of the ten months' year. The astrological extension of the 
ecliptical cycle consisted in assuming that when the cycle had recur- 
red as often as there were days in the civil month, the celestial sys- 
tem would be renewed ; and moreover that after ten such renewals, 
the system would come to an end. The basis of astrology is always 
the truth; it is only the superstructure that is false; unfortunately, 
the superstructure forms the greatest part of it. At each renewal of 
the celestial system, according to this theory, a new incarnation of 
the Deity, a new Messiah, would visit the earth and bring to it love, 
peace and happiness. Said lesnu, or lesChrishna: "Whenever there 
is decline of righteousness and uprising of unrighteousness, then I 
project myself into Creation. For the protection of the righteous 
and the destruction of the evil-doer and for the proper establishment 
of the law of righteousness, I appear from Age to Age. ... At 
the end of a kalpa all things return into my nature and then at the 
beginning of a kalpa, I again project them." Bhagavad Vita, IV, 7, 8; 
IX, 7- 



ANCIENT ASTRONOMY, ASTROLOGY AND RELIGION. 5 

The remotest period to which a knowledge of the kalpa or eclipti- 
cal cycle can be traced is the Mahabharata wars. The messianic 
theory, which is based upon it, is of course later, though how much 
later cannot at present be determined with assurance. It is certainly 
earlier than the aera of Gotama, for it was at that period when the 
year, previously of ten months, was first sub-divided into twelve 
months and when the other tens were changed to twelves. 

Monuments, letters, language, names, dates, popular customs, re- 
ligious rites and festivals, calendars, zodiacs, and numerous other 
evidences still extant, combine to prove the Indian origin of the mes- 
sianic theory, the Divine Year of 658 common years, the Earth's 
Journey, and the various doctrines that grew out of these concep- 
tions. That they flowed out of India westward into Persia, Baby- 
lonia, Egypt, Greece and Rome, can be demonstrated so overwhel- 
mingly that the cosmogonies which refuse to recognize this great 
fact will either have to suffer revision or fall into contempt. The 
Babylonians and Assyrians imported almost all their religious mate- 
rials from India; their heaven and hell are both Indian; the Baby- 
lonian messiah, Nara-Sin, is the fourth incarnation of the Indian 
Vishnu ; the Man-lion of the Assyrian seals and cylinders is his Indian 
zodion;* the Babylonian cross and svastica are Indian; the Syrian 
gods, patriarchs, religious cycles, year of the Creation and names 
of the months are all Indian; the Egyptian worship of Mother and 
Child, the cup and sacred heart, the steeple, cross, bell, rosaries, 
altars, censors, holy water, rite of baptism, soul's journey to purga- 
tory, etc., are all Indian, the Greek messiahs down to the period of 
Alexander are all Indian; the Gaulish Hesus, Virgo Paritura and 
cross quarter-days are Indian; the Gothic Woden and Fricca, and 
Yule-tide are Indian; while many of the Roman festivals, ceremonies, 
rites, symbols and mysteries, both before and after the inception of 
Christianity, are also Indian. On the contrary, there is no evidence 
that the Indians ever imported any religious beliefs, customs, rites 
or tokens from the West. Religious light from the West would pro- 
voke a smile not only in India but in any country. The course of 
religion as well as of empire has almost invariably been from east to 
west; not from west to east. " 

' Cesnola found in Cyprus a cylinder of Naram-Sin, son of Sharrukin, who "knew 
not his father." Laing's "Human Origins," pp. 5£-6. This is plainly Nara-Sin 
and Varaguin, the fourth and third incarnations of lesnu, or Vishnu. 

' In 1497, when Vasco De Gama and his party first beheld a Hindu temple and ob- 
served its ceremonies and ritual, they mistook it for a Christian church and piously 



6 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

The doors through which these heterogeneous materials entered the 
pantheon of Rome were opened by Roman arms. Quirinus, the In- 
dian Quichena, came from conquered Etruria; Ischenou, Chres, 
Jasius and Dionysius from conquered Greece; Osiris, Isis and Horus 
from conquered Egypt; Serapis from conquered Pontus; and Nebo- 
Nazaru, Thammuz, and Bel from conquered Babylon. It was not 
that the Romans were prone to worship the gods of their enemies; 
on the contrary, we shall presently see that one of the first acts of 
their victorious commanders was to impose a Roman god upon the 
nations they subjugated; it was that their captives were so numerous 
that all of these foreign religions secured a footing in those parts of 
the empire to which their votaries were consigned as colonists or 
slaves. Thus while the Greek Bacchus was secretly worshipped in 
Italy, Titus Quinctius Flamininus was openly worshipped in Chalcis 
and Apollonia ; and while the rites of the Celtic Hesus were smuggled 
into Rome, Quintus Sertorius set himself up for the Messiah in Celtic 
Spain. There is also reason to suspect that Caesar practiced a similar 
imposture in Gaul, just as Columbus, Cortes and Pizarro afterwards 
did in America. It is not without significance that the pre-Roman 
Hesus of the Cluny Museum is dressed in a Roman toga. Caesar's 
contemporaries, Sylla, Pompey, Sextus, Marc Antony and Octavius, 
the moment they were entrusted with consular ofiice, set themselves 
up for gods. It is difficult to believe that Caesar waited until after 
the conquest of Egypt before adopting a similar means of acquiring 
authority, or of attaining supreme power. 

In addition to the gods whom she acquired by conquest or added 
by imposture, Rome imported a fresh deity when she opened a direct 
line of commercial communication with India. A small and indirect 
commerce with the Orient had previously been pursued by way of 
Rhodes, afterwards through Alexandria and still later through Taren- 
tum and the Calabrian and Illyrian ports of the Veneti, from whom 
Rome captured a line of emporia which led from Italy to the Euxine, 
and thence by the Palus Mseotis to the Orient. It was not until 
the conquest of Egypt was effected by Caesar that the Romans ac- 
quired a direct channel of trade with the East. This was in B. C. 48, 
or, according to our present chronology, 15 years after the Hindu re- 
incarnation of les Chrishna, in the person, real or pretended, of 

worshipped at the altar. R. S. Whiteway's "Rise of the Portuguese Power in India," 
London, 1899. "When, during the present century the British sepoys landed in Egypt 
they, in like manner, mistook the Christian churches for Hindu temples and there 
knelt in prayer. Higgins' " Anacalypsis." 



ANCIENT ASTRONOMY, ASTROLOGY AND RELIGION, 7 

Salivahana, son of Maia. The Romans now got their mythology 
fresh from its original mint; and some of its features thus obtained 
will duly appear in the legends and ritual which were manufactured 
for Augustus by his subservient courtiers, astrologers and calendar- 
makers. 

To preface an account of the Augustan worship with a history of 
all the pretended incarnations of the Deity that preceded and led up 
to it, would fatigue the reader at the outset. The student who is 
curious in this respect will find a very complete account of them in 
the author's work on "The Messiah." It will be going sufficiently 
far afield if in the present work we begin our account of Eastern and 
Western incarnations with those of Alexander, the Seleucid?e and the 
Ptolemies. It can scarcely be doubted that the worship of these 
personages as deities, throughout the extensive provinces over which 
they reigned and which afterwards passed under the yoke of Rome, 
had fully prepared and accustomed their inhabitants to the kind of 
worship which Augustus deemed it essential to demand of them. 

If to these are added some account of the Iberian and Gaulish 
Hesus and of the Indian Salivahana, it is believed that the reader 
will be sufficiently prepared for the important but hitherto submerged 
Institute upon which as we believe rested the whole weight of the 
Roman imperial constitution. 



CHAPTER II. 

EASTERN AND WESTERN INCARNATIONS. 

Philip of Macedon — Alexander of Macedon — Ptolemy Soter — Ptolemy Epiphanes — 
Seleucus Epiphanes — Antiochus Soter — Antiochus Theos — Antiochus Epiphanes — 
Revolt of the Maccabees — Deification of Demetrius Poliocetes — The Parthian god- 
kings — Romulus (Quirinus) — Numa Pompilius — Scipio Africanus — Titus Quinctius 
Flamininus — Sylla — Quintus Sertorius — Hesus — Salivahana. 

BEFORE the erection of their government into a Republic the 
Athenians had been well grounded by their priests in the Brah- 
minical doctrine of their own heavenly descent. They were taught 
that every freeborn Athenian was descended from Jupiter and Apollo ; 
and one of the forms of this egotistical creed even crept into the 
Republic, whose archons, before they were invested with office, had 
to affirmatively answer the question: "Are you related to Apollo 
Patriusand Jupiter Herceus? " which was equivalent to asking: "Are 
you a descendant of the gods?" ' Although intelligent persons knew 
very well that they were not so descended and therefore that the 
question was practically, "Are you a freeborn citizen of Athens? " 
yet there was a numerous class of sojourners and helots whom policy 
rendered it necessary to cajole or overawe with this fabulous pretence 
of divine origin. The Greek mind was therefore well prepared for 
the reception of the Incarnation Myth, a fact which the reader should 
not fail to recall whenever any of the following extraordinary circum- 
stances exceed the measure of his credulity. 

It is evident that, at some period of the wars which ended by 
placing both Greece and part of Asia Minor at his feet, Philip of 
Macedon designed to assume the part of a divinity. He traced his 
descent from Hercules and his wife's from Achilles; and it may have 
been in furtherance of this purpose that he also caused his wife's name, 
originally Myrtalis, to be changed to the more sacred one of Olym- 
pias. Whether her opposition to Philip's design was the cause of 
their estrangement and subsequent divorce, does not appear; yet 
some circumstances point that way. After divorcing Olympias, Philip 

' Potter, Ant. Gr., Book i, chap. xii. 



EASTERN AND WESTERN INCARNATIONS. 9 

married Cleopatra, the niece of Attalus of Macedon, and by her had 
a son. To commemorate this event he ordered a festival and solemn 
games to be celebrated at JEgse. The proceedings opened with the 
presentation of crowns of gold to the king from all the dependent 
states. On the day succeeding the feast, the statues of the Twelve 
gods were born in procession, and a thirteenth statue followed, of 
more exquisite materials and workmanship than the others. This 
represented Philip himself and signified the divine rank which he in- 
tended to assume. " Upon issuing from his palace, accompanied by 
Alexander, his son (by Olympias) and Alexander the vassal king of 
Epirus, Philip was seen clothed in a white flowing robe, the kind of 
habiliment in which the Grecian deities were usually represented. 
What ceremony was designed to be performed in the theatre, toward 
which the procession moved, we cannot tell, for at the moment that 
the king approached the entrance, he was suddenly stabbed to death 
by Pausanias. 

The assassin was immediately pursued, overtaken and despatched 
by the spectators and his body was exposed upon a gibbet; yet the 
next morning it appeared crowned with a golden diadem, which had 
been placed upon it by the order either of Olympias, or Alexander. 
The body was then taken down and laid with that of Philip; the fu- 
nereal honours were divided between the king and his murderer ; both 
bodies were burnt on the same pile, and their ashes deposited in the 
same tomb. It is reported that Olympias, who superintended these 
ceremonies, also prevailed on the Macedonians to solemize annual 
obsequies to Pausanias and that she consecrated to Apollo the dagger 
which had been the instrument of her husband's death. 

It is hardly necessary to observe that such extraordinary proceed- 
ings would never have been permitted to take place without the 
sanction and approval of the ecclesiastical authorities. Unless in 
their eyes Philip had committed an act of impiety and sacrilege, by 
associating his own image with that of the gods and by assuming, 
without their concurrence, the conventional habiliments of a divinity, 

' This statue of Philip was only one of several origins of the unlucky reputation of the 
number Thirteen. For example, Plutarch, in Demetrius, says that that divinity pun- 
ished the disobedience of the Thebans by crucifying Thirteen of them and forgiving 
the remainder. So in the tragedy of CEnomaus, by Lucius Accius, or Attius, who 
flourished about A. U. 583-617, thirteen noble youths are sacrificed in a vain attempt 
of the king of Elis to defeat a sacred prophecy. Consult Cic. ad Pap. Paetus. To 
go still further we find the high priest Manetho, in Josephus upon Apion i, 28, al- 
luding to the thirteen years of Amenophis. Indeed the thirteen puzzle is probably as 
old as the Buddhic calendar. Consult the Index to the present work. 



lO THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

it is inconceivable that the Macedonians should have allowed Olym- 
pias to pursue the strange course attributed to her and in which Al- 
exander, then twenty-one years of age, appears to have connived. 

The death of Philip was the signal for a rising of the subject Greek 
states; but Alexander struck them such a blow by destroying Thebes 
(B. C. 334) and butchering or enslaving its helpless worshippers of 
the blue-eyed Virgin *, that the other states finally submitted, by 
sending him the contingents which he demanded for his Oriental ex- 
pedition. Without giving the recruits a pause he led them at once 
across the Hellespont, defeated the Persian satraps at the passage of 
the Granicus and soon found himself in possession of all Asia Minor. 
Advancing southward along the coast, he encountered the Persian 
host, under Darius, at Jassus, a place situated at the head of the gulf 
of Cyprus. * The result was the total rout of Darius and the disper- 
sion of all hostile forces from the valleys and plains of Asia Minor. 
This victory Alexander commemorated by erecting altars to Jupiter, 
Hercules and Minerva, which appear to have been still standing in 
the time of Cicero. * 

To the Macedonian the way was now open to Egypt, to India, to 
universal dominion. Pursuing his victorious march toward Egypt, 
the fleet following the army with supplies, Alexander next besieged 
and destroyed Tyre, (July, B. C. 332,) then the chief emporium of 
the Oriental trade. In the same year he entered Egypt and sum- 
moned the Persian satraps to surrender to his forces. 

Alexander's declaration to the Macedonians, that on the death of 
Philip, not the purposes, but only the name of their sovereign was 
changed ; the murder of his young step-brother, the son of Cleopatra; 
his care while demolishing Thebes, not to efface or injure any of the 
orthodox religious edifices ; his moving the Athenians to build a minor 

' That the "blue-eyed virgin" was worshipped in Thebes is evident from the nu- 
merous images of this divinity taken from the ancient sepulchres of Tanagra, about 
midway between Thebes and Athens, in 1873. The hair is, without exception, reddish 
brown, the eyes always blue. Some of these figures are now in the museums of St. 
Petersburg, Berlin, Paris and London. They are scarcely to be distinguished from 
modern figures of a similar kind. 

* Spelt variously as Jasus, Jassus, Issus, lesus, etc. The orthography of the text 
is from Qo Curtius, At Mileto, Alexander saw a youth whose piety and wisdom tamed 
the very fishes of the sea. This youth was of, or named, Jassus, and Alexander ap- 
pointed him high-priest, sacred to Neptune, who, according to some, was the brother 
and spouse of Magna Dea, whilst others say he was the father of that favorite god- 
dess. Transl. Q. Curtius, i, 225; Tooke's Pantheon, 179; Pausanias.Arcadics, chap. 48. 

6 «« We encamped at the foot of Mt. Amanus, near Alexander's altars." Cicero, ad 
Marcus Cato, A. U. 703. 



EASTERN AND WESTERN INCARNATIONS. II 

temple to Pausanias, the assassin of his sacreligious father: his mag- 
nificent sacrifices and imperial gifts to the temple of Jupiter Olympus 
at Dium, of Minerva at Troy, and of Diana at Ephesus; his splendid 
gifts to the priests everywhere ; his ostentatious erection of new altars 
to Jupiter, Hercules, Neptune, Minerva, and Diana; and the endow- 
ment of new livings upon their ecclesiastical officers; the continual 
allusion to his own divine descent from Hercules; the declaration 
that he was a ten months' child ^; the deposit of his own bejeweled 
armour in the Trojan temple of Minerva and the adoption in its place 
of a portion of the rough, but sacred armour, which the priests pre- 
tended had hung there since the Homeric period; his attempted al- 
teration of the Macedonian month Decius to Artemisius Bis '; the 
religious impostures which he directed Aristander to practice; the 
picture of himself grasping a thunderbolt, which was ordered for the 
temple of Ephesian Diana and for which he paid Apelles twenty 
talents; besides numerous other evidences, all point to the design of 
his own deification. ® 

His father Philip had approached a similar design rudely and sac- 
religiously. Alexander had made atonement for this error by hon- 
ouring the remains and the memory of his father's murderer, he had 
conciliated the priesthood, and by continually repeating the fable of 
his own divine origin, he had possibly come to believe in it himself. 

Whatever scruples remained on this subject, they were sweptaway 
by the victory at Jassus. Darius, whom he had defeated, was a god; 
not only this, but he was a god over numerous minor gods, the kings 
and satraps of his extensive empire, many of whom had been ac- 
knowledged by their subjects and worshipped as divinities. Therefore 
his conqueror, Alexander, could be no less than a god. Indeed, under 
the circumstances, it is difficult to see how Alexander could escape 
from making use of this form of exaltation. This appears to have 
been the opinion of Arrian, who wrote on the subject as follows: " I 
cannot condemn him (Alexander) for endeavouring to draw his sub- 
jects into the belief of his divine origin, nor can I be induced to think 
it any great crime, for it is very reasonable to imagine that he in- 

* Q. Curtius, X, 4. 

' Q. Curtius, Supp. i, 195. Alexander probably made far more important alterations 
of the Calendar, but the medieval transcribers and mutilators of the Greek text have 
swept them out of sight. 

* It was doubtless to the numerous sacrifices, gifts, endowments and other benefac- 
tions with which he appeased the avidity of a degraded ecclesiasticism, that he owes his 
surname of the Great, a title which, throughout all history, has been reserved only for 
those who earned the gratitude of the church. 



12 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

tended no more by it than merely to procure greater authority among 

his soldiers. ' 

It is related by Josephus that when Alexander approached Jerusa- 
lem the high-priest Jaddus cleverly smoothed the path which the 
Macedonian had evidently determined to climb. He discovered a 
fitting presage of Alexander's divinity and incarnation in the prophe- 
cies of Daniel, and diplomatically indicated to the Greek commander 
the proper locality in which the solemn ceremony of his recognition 
should take place. " This was at the temple of Jupiter Ammon, in 
the Lybian Desert. The result of his summons to the Persian gar- 
risons of Egypt was their unconditional surrender; and in B. C. 332, 
Alexander entered that country in person. After securing its strong- 
holds, he proceeded to the scene of his pretended elevation. Pre- 
paring the priests of Jupiter Ammon for the impending ceremony, by 
messages and costly presents sent in advance, Alexander, at the head 
of a legion, traversed the desert to this shrine and, entering the sa- 
cred enclosure, was there greeted and anointed by its chief priest, as 
the Son of God. 

"As the king approached, the senior priest saluted him as the Son, 
declaring that Jupiter the Father had bestowed the title. Alexander 
replied that he accepted it, and was assured of its validity. He then 
enquired whether the Father destined him to the empire of the globe. 
To this the hierarch replied that he should govern the whole earth." 
Alexander was then admitted to the temple, where he beheld Jupiter 
symbolized by a Lamb or Ram and where he sacrificed and presented 
gifts to the priests and attendants. " His friends then consulted the 
Oracle merely to know if they should yield divine honours to the king. 
The reply was, Jupiter desires that you shall render divine honours 

® Arrian, as quoted by Prof. John W. Draper, in " Religion and Science," London, 
ed. 1890, p. 9. 

'" Dr. Gillies, Mr. Moyle, (11, 26), and other critics altogether discredit the visit to 
Jerusalem. The pros and cons are briefly but comprehensively discussed in a foot- 
note to the Translation of Quintus Curtius, i, 257. If he simply wished to be deified, 
Pescinus would probably have better suited Alexander's object than Jerusalem; but as 
he also wanted soldiers and tribute, there seems to have been advanced no sound rea- 
son for doubting the text of Josephus, Antiq., xi, viii, 4-5. A similar tale is told in 
connection with the Arabian Conquest of Spain. Said Ibn Dhahan: "When Musa ar- 
rived in Andalus, one of the bishops of that country said to him, 'Oh, Musa! We 
find you mentioned in one of the prophets, who tells us of an illustrious prince, an- 
swering exactly to thy description, who is to enter this country' " (and conquer it). 
Al-Makkari, Appendix Ixxvii. The Indian priests in America had a similar legend for 
the Spanish conquerors. 

" The vernal equinox was at that period in the constellation Aries. 



EASTERN AND WESTERN INCARNATIONS. 13 

to your victorious sovereign. ''^ In all of Alexander's subsequent letters 
and despatches he assumed the title of the Son of God, and, as such, 
was acknowled by both the subject nations and the Greeks, '^ all ex- 
cept his mother Olympias, who according to one account rallied him 
with good humour, but in vain, concerning pretensions which threw 
a doubt upon the nature of her maternity.'* According to another 
account, she had gone to sleep in a temple, had been visited by a 
serpent, etc., whereupon Philip divorced her. '* 

Alexander died, it is alleged, from the effects of a debauch, on the 
28th Decius, B. C. 323, aged ^;^ years. ** Among the last words im- 
puted to him was the desire that his remains should be deposited in 
the temple of Jupiter Ammon. " As with most of the previous in- 
carnations, a new sera was counted from his apotheosis, (B. C. 332), 
called the Alexandrian; but with the rapid partition of his empire, it 
fell into disuse. It was afterwards buried beneath various alterations 
in the Macedonian, Attic and Roman calendars, the most important 
one of which was the subtraction of ten years from the Greek epoch 
of the Creation and, by consequence, from the Alexandrian sera as 
well. According to the Benedictine authors of L'art de Verifier les 
Dates, this was done in A. D. 285; however, the authority is sus- 
picious. It is much more likely to have been the work of some later 
''reformer " of the calendar. The result of this alteration is that 
many modern works of reference erroneously place the Alexandrian 
sera in B. C. 322 and sometimes in 323 and 324. " Down to recent 
years the Alexandrian sera was used in Abyssinia, where it is known 
as the Coptic. 

After the death of Alexander, the circumstances which led him to 
assume divinity, appear to have influenced in a similar manner those 
of his generals, who seized the various provinces of his empire. 
Ptolemy, who commanded in Egypt, having first deposited near 

" Q. Curtius. 

'^ Calisthenes of Olynthus, the friend of Aristotle and preceptor of Alexander, was 
mutilated, torn by wild beasts, and executed by poison, for refusing to worship Alex- 
ander as a god, B. C. 328. 

*■* It is a pity that Moore's " Oriental Pantheon " was not published when Dryden 
wrote his "Feast of Alexander." '^Justin, xi, ii. 

'•' Some reasons for believing that the Macedonian calendar was altered are given in 
the Transl. of Q. Curtius, 11, 407, n. 

" Alexander was called Eicornis by the ancient Arabians, Bicorniger by the Romans, 
and Iss-Kanderby the Moslems. All these are surnames of Bacchus, or les Chrishna. 

'^ Nicolas, Hist. Chronolog)'; L'art de Verifier les Dates; the Transl. of Q. Curtius; 
Appleton, art. "Chronology;" Haydn, "Mundane .(Eras." 



I4 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

Memphis the embalmed remains of Alexander, subsequently entombed 
them at Alexandria, in a magnificent serapion, dedicated to Jupiter 
Ammon. " Upon mounting the throne of Egypt Ptolemy assumed 
the surname of Soter, or Saviour. It was this monarch who invaded 
Syria and annexed Judea as an appanage to Egypt. The eighth and 
ninth Ptolemies were also named Soter, whilst the fifth was called 
Epiphanes, or Manifestation of the Deity. These sacred titles indi- 
cate the assumption of that same form of exaltation which Alexander 
had obtained. 

In B. C. 311, Seleucus, surnamed Epiphanes and Nicanor, another 
of Alexander's generals, having first murdered his step-mother and 
infant brother, entered Babylon and established the Sacred empire 
which bears his name. After this, it was discovered that his mother 
had conceived him through a miracle and that his father was Apollo. "" 
In a temple which he erected to Jupiter Ammon, at Antioch, he was 
solemnly recognized as the Son of God, (Apollo). On some of his 
numismatic effigies appear the sacred horn of Taurus and the supreme 
title of Basileus, or sovereign-pontiff; on others, the head of Jupiter, 
the Father. ^' 

The surnames or titles of his successors, Antiochus Soter, Antiochus 
Theos, Antiochus Epiphanes and the sacred emblems on their coins, 
such as Jupiter, Apollo, Minerva, Diana, Hercules, the Eagle and 
the Thunderbolt, afford proofs that this pretence of heavenly origin 
was continued. Their titles, as stamped upon the coins, afford other 
proofs. These were the God, Son of God, the Saviour, the Basileus, 
etc., thus, Antiochus Theou Epiphanes, or God Incarnate. Still 
other proofs are derived from their histories. It was Antiochus IV., 
(Epiphanes) King of Syria, who set up the statue of his pretended 
father Jupiter, in the Temple. His attempt to compel the Jews to 
worship him, Antiochus, as a god, gave rise to the insurrection of 
Mattathias and his sons, the Maccabees. Antiochus VIII., Epipha- 
nes, nicknamed Gryphus, proclaimed his mother as Diva Ceres and 
himself, as the Son of God. His sera, as well as that of Tyre and 
Sidon, which he conquered, was B.C. 125, exactly oneludi sseculares 
before the Apotheosis of Augustus. Indeed, down to the time when 
Pompey reduced Judea to a Roman province, (B. C. 65), all the 

" Alexandria was built on the site of an Egyptian town called Rha-cotis. Pausanias, 
Eliacs, 21. 

^"Justin. The fact that at first he was worshipped as the son of Apollo and after- 
wards as Apollo himself seemed to have presented no difficulty to the perverted minds 
of the Greeks. ^^ Humphreys, 145. 



EASTERN AND WESTERN INCARNATIONS. I5 

princes of the Seleucidan line were successively deified and required 
to be worshipped as Sons of God. Like the previous dynasties of in- 
carnated gods, this line also established an sera, '^'^ which was named 
after Seleucus and began B. C. 311, the year when its founder was 
deified. Nicolas dates the £era September ist, B. C. 311. Haydn says 
September ist, 312. The apparent date was the autumnal equinox, 
or the first moon following it, of the year B. C. 311. " The (Au- 
gustan) sera of Antiochus Gryphus was B. C. no, since altered to 
B. C. 125. 

Demetrius Poliocetes, born B. C. 337, died B. C. 283, was king of 
Macedon, 294-287. He was the son of Antigonus, who in the first 
division of Alexander's empire, received for his share several prov- 
inces of Asia Minor. After taking part in his father's wars in Syria 
against Eumenes and Ptolemy, Demetrius sailed to Greece, and in 
307 took Athens without resistance. Anarchy, civil wars, and fear, 
had now brought the Greeks so low, that they hastened to greet and 
worship both the absent Antigonus and the present Demetrius, as 
gods and "god-protectors." Temples were erected or altered in 
their honour; priests were appointed to conduct a worship which was 
profanely addressed to these divinities; an altar was erected upon the 
spot where Demetrius first landed, and consecrated to Demetrius 
Cantabates; his portrait was depicted or wrought in the peplum or 
holy veil; and the Greeks changed the number of their tribes from 
ten to twelve, calling the new ones Antigonis and Demetrias; thus 
raising the senate from five hundred to six hundred members. 
But adulation did not stop even here. Led by Stratocles, Dromoclides, 
and other sycophants, the senate decreed that the messengers who 
should be sent on public business to either Antigonus or Demetrius 
should be called theori, a sacred title, hitherto reserved for the holy 
officers, who on solemn festivals carried the sacrifices to Delphi and 
Olympia; that the same worship should be paid to Demetrius as to 
Ceres (Maia) and the infant Bacchus; that the festival of Bacchus, 
previously called Dion-Issus, should be called Demetrius; that the 
month Munychion should be called Demetrion ; that the last day of 
every month should be called Demetrias; that sacrifices should be 
made to Demetrius as to a god; that Demetrius as the god-protector 
should be consulted as a holy oracle and besought to reveal to man- 
kind the most pious and acceptable method or ritual of consecrating 

'- Nicolas says, under the Mra of Constantinople, that the Civil year began on 
September ist, whilst the ecclesiastical year began with the vernal equinox, ranging 
from 2ist March to ist April. ^'^ Cf. Plutarch, in vita; " The Messiah," p. 153. 



1 6 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

an intended offering of shields to Delphi; that the temple of the Par- 
thenon, sacred to the Virgin goddess Minerva, should be consecrated 
as a palace for the sacred Demetrius; that his word and act were In- 
fallible and should be accounted holy in respect of the gods and just in 
respect of men; that he be invited both to the Lesser mysteries and 
the Greater; and that the office of archon and the custom of giving 
the archon's name to the year be abolished, and a new aera begun 
with the advent of the new god Demetrius. 

With respect to the motives which prompted these digraceful de- 
crees, we have the testimony of the cautious Plutarch: " Excessive 
honours are very indifferent proofs of regard for conquerors, because 
the value of such honours rests in their being voluntarily given, and 
there can be no certainty that they were not rendered in fear; thus 
fear and love produce similar popular demonstrations. AVise princes 
will not regard statues or divine honours as evidences of popular 
gratitude or affection, but rather as dedicated by fear or necessity. 
Nothing more frequently happens than that the people hate their 
sovereign the most, at the same time when he is the object of their 
most slavish adulation. " Pausanias is more decided : ' ' Men are not 
gods; they are dignified with that appellation only through fulsome 
flattery; and their crimes will be punished with the wrath of heaven 
when they depart from hence." (Arcadics, II.) 

The use to which Demetrius put the honours decreed to him shows 
how unworthily they were bestowed. He planted an army of wives, 
concubines, slaves and catamites in the Parthenon, which he "so 
polluted with his debaucheries that it appeared to be kept compara- 
tively clean when he indulged himself only with such abandoned 
creatures as Lamia, Demo, and Anticyra. " " He bestowed upon his 
principal wife the sacrilegious name of Dei-damia, or the Spouse of 
God. " He authorized suddenly and collected with great severity 
an extraordinary tax of 250 talents, the whole of which was bestowed 
upon Lamia, wherewith to furnish her toilet; indeed, he conferred 
upon this favourite of his harem the extraordinary power of levying 
taxes without his intervention, a privilege which she exercised so 
freely as to gain for herself the surname of Devourer; and he devoted 
his daughter Stratonica to an incestuous marriage ; for she lived first 
with Seleucus Epiphanes the father, and afterwards with Antiochus 
Soter, his son, Demetrius wore "a double diadem, a robe of purple 

^* Demo and Anticyra are names which appear to have derisive meanings. Lamia 
was one of the many names for the Mother of the Gods. 

*^ In most of the ancient mythologies the Spouse and Mother of God were the same. 



EASTERN AND WESTERN INCARNATIONS. 17 

interwoven with gold, shoes of gold cloth, with soles of fine purple. *® 
There was a robe a long time inweaving for him, of most sumptuous 
magnificence. The figure of the world and all the heavenly bodies 
were being displayed upon it ; but it was left unfinished. " He became 
difficult of access and either declined to grant an interview to those 
accredited to him, or treated them in a distant and haughty manner. 
Though he favoured the Athenians more than the other Greeks, their 
ambassadors waited at his court (of Pella) two years for an answer.** 

It would weary the reader to describe all the pretended incarna- 
tions of historical persons that, like a pestilence, ravaged the various 
countries which had formed the empire of Alexander. From Arsaces 
I., a robber chieftain, who carved the Parthian, out of a portion of 
the Seleucidan empire, B. C. 250, down to Arsaces XII., (Theos) who 
demanded that Pompey should address him as Basileos-Basileii, the 
whole of this line assumed to be gods sent from heaven to bring 
peace and happiness to a world steeped in sin and misery. ^^ Badly 
mutilated as is the Greek literature of this period, it is still full of 
incarnations; and when the dismembered remains of the Greek em- 
pire fell under the dominion of Rome, the infection spread to Italy, 
where indeed a foundation for it already existed, but had long re- 
mained used. 

It is now agreed on all hands that the early history of Rome, like 
the early history of all the states of antiquity, is fabulous; and that 
Romulus, Numa Pompilius, and many other of its early heroes, never 
existed at all, or, if they did, that their real history is entirely lost 
in the mass of fiction and imposture with which their names are as- 
sociated. If conjecture be permitted to supply the place of fact, in 
a matter which can be of little practical importance one way or the 
other, Rome, which is not mentioned by Herodotus, nor Thucydides, 
grew up after their agra, from the debris of the Etruscan and Greek 
empires. ^° The Etruscan states had existed in Italy from a remote 

*^ Jullius Csesar and, after him, both the pagan and Christian chief-pontifices wore 
similar slippers, which they required all who approached them, to kiss. " Our Rome cor- 
respondent telegraphs that a party of sixty Canadian pilgrims were received yesterday 
by the Pope. They brought some handsome contributions for His Holiness and were 
rewarded by being admitted to kiss the Pope's foot." London Morning Chronicle, 
September 3, 1894. 

^''Justin, X, li, 5. Ammianus Marcellinus, xxiii. 

"^ The evidences of these Sassanian incarnations appear on the coins. 

'•'^ Rome was first mentioned by Theopompus. Consult Niebuhr; Dunlop; Thomp- 
son, Rom. Lit.; and Dr. Adams, Rom, Ant, The Veneti probably also influenced 
the early history of Rome. 



l8 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. < 

epoch, and in common with all the states of the Levant, had derived 
their astrology, religion and form of government, from India, Chal- 
dea and Egypt. This opinion, which is based upon numerous evi- 
dences derived from archaeology, comparative philology and other 
sources, is corroborated by the Etruscan institutes, for example, the 
ten gods, the ten commandments, the ten months of the year, the 
ten judices, the ten tribes, the ten silver for one of gold, in certain 
of its states; and the twelve gods, commandments, months, etc., in 
others. The Romans, in extending their dominion over the adjoin- 
ing Etruscan states, were obliged to accept these institutes without 
always understanding their significance; hence the strange admix- 
ture of these two numbers in their own resulting institutes of gov- 
ernment. If it be supposed that the states of Etruria were arrayed 
against one another in religious wars, the nature of which was re- 
flected in an attempt to change the original ten gods and ten series 
of institutes to twelve, and that this occurred during the period 
when the sun was in the sign Gemini, we shall have, at all events, a 
plausible theory upon which to base the origin of the Roman state 
and the Roman myth of the twins Romulus and Remus. '" 

However this may be, Romulus was certainly regarded by the 
Romans of a later period, as an incarnation of the deity. The twins 
were ten months' children, born of the virgin Rhea Sylvia, by the god 
Mars. Shortly after their desertion and miraculous preservation, 
Remus was killed. Romulus, with the sacred title of Quirinus ", 
became the deified king and high-priest of the state which he had 
founded. He organized the Flammes Quirinales, and at his death, 
his body was surrounded by a flame and snatched up to heaven. Like 
the previous incarnations, Romulus established an sera. This dated 
from his divine birth which Timseus and Cicero fixed in B. C. 814 or 
816; the ?era now in use, B. C. 753, being that of the Apotheosis of 
Romulus, attributed to Varro, while the Christian equivalent is that 
which has been adopted by the Latin Sacred College. There are, 
however, many other calculations of this aera '^, one of which makes 
it agree with B. C. 750, in which case Romulus, like Alexander, died 
in his thirty-third year, because his death, according to Dionysius, 
occurred B. C. 717. As the aera of Romulus coincides, to the day, 

^'^ Lanciani's theory of the sherds and shepherds is that of a savant whose learning 
and mythology are at deadly war. " Ancient Rome," chap. 11. 

^^ From the Oriental Quiche-na, Quirishna, or Chrishna. 

2^ These calculations vary from the 28th year before the first quadrennial Olympiad 
to the fourth year of the twelfth Olympiad. See Appendix S. 



EASTERN AND WESTERN INCARNATIONS. I9 

with that assumed for the building of Rome, the Republic, during its 
period of freedom, termed it anno urbis conditae, and by this name 
it has passed ever since. " 

We now come to the strangely confused story of Numa. Plutarch, 
in Numa, says: "There is a great diversity among historians con- 
cerning the time when Numa lived," yet his reign is now ascribed, 
with suspicious exactness, to the period B. C. 715-673. Numa is 
regarded by Livy and other Roman writers as an historical person- 
age; but modern research has established beyond all reasonable 
doubt, that as represented by Livy, he was a myth, copied to some 
extent from the myth of Buddha. It is possible that the story of 
Numa was invented and introduced into the history of Rome by some 
religious reformer of the republican £era, with the view to discourage 
hierarchical government, idolatry and caste. Livy admits that ' ' Clod- 
ius, in his emendations of chronology, says that the ancient archives 
were destroyed when Rome was sacked by the Gauls, and that those 
now extant were forged in favour of certain persons who desired to 
prove from them an illustrious lineage." They may have taken the 
same opportunity to "prove " some other things as well. 

It is related of Numa that upon being offered the kingdom of Rome 
by the ambassadors of that state, he at first declined it, saying: "I 
am only of mortal race and you must be aware that my bringing up 
and education was in the ordinary manner. " But as they'persisted, 
and as his countrymen, the Sabines, recommended his acceptance of 
the office, in order to more firmly bind the Romans and Sabines in 
friendship, he at last consented. His first act of government was to 
dismiss the three hundred Celeres, or chosen men, who had formed 
a body-guard to the king. He abolished the distinction of Roman 
and Sabine, and broke up the tendency toward caste by the estab- 
lishment of trade-guilds, into one or another of which, all the citizens 
were enrolled. He "reformed" the calendar, by altering the divis- 
ion of the year from ten into twelve months. He abolished the sac- 
rifices of all animate objects, confining the offerings to "flour, wine 
and other simple and inexpensive things." He divided the public 
lands among the poor, turned the energies of the people from war to 
agriculture, rewarded the most assiduous with posts of honour and 
trust, and maintained for the state so profound a peace, that the 
temple of Janus was shut for forty-three years. He proclaimed the 

^^ It is difficult to say when the Romans first began to believe in the incarnation of 
Romulus; perhaps not until after the decline of the Commonwealth. 



20 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

unity of the Creator and strictly "forbade the Romans to represent 
the Deity in the form either of man or beast. Nor was there among 
them formerly (/. ^. , after Numa's edict) any image or statue of the 
Creator. During the first years, they erected temples and other sa- 
cred structures, but placed in them no images of any kind, persuaded 
that it was impious to represent things divine by what is perishable, 
and that we can have no perception of the Creator but by the under- 
standing." ^* 

Thus far the chronicles of Numa contain nothing very incredible; 
and such may have been their character at the period of their original 
composition. But when, as we may suppose, the Roman republic 
began to decline, the attachment of the popular mind for the marvel- 
lous, rapidly added to them ; and this is what was added : "By direc- 
tion of the gods Numa was born the twenty-first of April, the same 
day that Rome was founded by Romulus. " He received his institutes 
direct from the hands of the goddess Egeria, who according to some 
authors, was the same as Maia, Lucina, Cybele, Diana, Juno, etc., 
nay, she even lived with him as his spouse; and Plutarch has an ar- 
gument in which he supports the credibility of this legend. Numa 
learnt from the gods and composed for mankind, an ointment of 
"onions, hair and pilchards, which is used to this day," to allay 
thunder and lightning; and being chided by Jupiter for thus disclosing 
the secret pharmacy of heaven, he confronted the god and, like 
father Tom Loftus with the Pope, he downed him in argument. 

The next incarnation asserted or attempted in Rome was when the 
resources of the state, having been depleted by the first two Punic 
wars, she was obliged to make political concessions to those patrician 
families whose wealth constituted the only fund upon which she 
could now draw. The immediate result of this compact was the 
splendid prize of Spain; its eventual result was the extinction of the 

^* Plutarch, in Numa. Brady, Clav. Cal., has a passage in which he justly distin- 
guishes between symbols and idols, in the worship of images. If the Creator is wor- 
shipped through a symbol, says he, then any symbol of the Creator would suffice for 
a visible object of such worship; but when an especial symbol or image is worshipped 
and miraculous movements or powers are attributed to such image, as for example, 
sweating, or bleeding, or healing, or other miracles, then no pretence of symbol-wor- 
ship can render it otherwise than idolatry; for it is then the thing itself that is wor- 
shipped, dreaded, or loved, for the power it is supposed to possess, and not the 
Creator, symbolized by such thing. The " Pall Mall Gazette " of April 8, 1892, con- 
tains an account of a blind and paralytic woman, who was instantly and completely 
healed by an imaf::e at Lourdes. 



EASTERN AND WESTERN INCARNATIONS. 21 

Roman democracy. '' Among the patrician families which had dis- 
tinguished itself in the great services it had rendered to the state, 
was the Cornelian, to which gens belonged Pub. Scipio Africanus, 
(Major,) the conqueror of the Land of Gold and Silver. It has been 
frequently remarked by modern historians that the Roman conquest 
of Spain was in many respects like the subsequent Spanish conquest 
of America. In one respect it was totally unlike it; in the case of 
America the mother country destroyed all the gods who were wor- 
shipped by the natives; in the case of Spain, Rome almost acquired 
a new god for its own pantheon. 

The approaching Ludi Saeculares of A. U. 550 is probably what put 
Scipio Africanus upon the design of godship. The legend is given 
by Aulus Gellius out of Oppius and Hyginus, the biographers of 
Scipio. It is also mentioned by Censorinus. The wife of Publius 
Scipio was barren for so many years as to create a despair of issue, 
until one night, her husband being absent, she discovered a serpent 
in his place and, upon consulting the sooth-sayers respecting this 
miracle, it was predicted that she would bear a Divine Infant. After 
ten months she gave birth to the future conqueror of Carthage. 

In furtherance of this imposture, Scipio, (who, by the way, had 
been ordained a priest of Mars,) "was accustomed to visit the Capi- 
tolium in the extremity of the night and before the dawn of day, and 
to order the cella or shrine of Jove to be opened, in which he would 
remain alone for a length of time, as if he were communing with the 
god upon affairs of state ; and it was observed that the fierce dogs 
who guarded the approach to the temple against others, never so 
much as barked at him." " 

Scipio triumphed B. C. 201, during the consulship of Cn. Cornelius 
Lentulus, one of his own, the Cornelian, gens, and P. yElius Paetus, 
his intimate friend. The pontifex maximus was Publius Licinius 
Crassus, who had been appointed A. U. 541, or B. C. 213. The 
apotheosis of Asoka in India and the closure of the Temple of Janus 
in Rome for 1 7 years, are both close to the date of Scipio's attempted 
deification, and may be connected with it; but owing to the altera- 
tions in the Roman calendar by Sylla and Augustus, especially by the 
latter, the order of events cannot be deduced with certainty. Whether 
Scipio, who was believed to have secretly amassed enormous riches, 

^5 There is a curious resemblance between these circumstances and the depleted re- 
sources of Macedon under Philip followed by his conquest of the gold mines of 
Grenida, (Philippi). Transl. Q. Curtius, i, 43, 179. 

3^ Aulus Gellius, vii, i; Censorinus, de Die Natale; Herbert, in, 449. 



/ 

i 
22 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

was niggard in his gifts to the ecclesiastics, or because the Roman 
people were not yet sufficiently ignorant or degraded to accept the 
imposture, or because they still had a Cato to expose cant and restrain 
ambition, does not appear; but Scipio's design miscarried. The 
would-be divinity was accused by Cato with having embezzled money 
belonging to the state and with having accepted a treasonable bribe 
from Antiochus III., one of the Seleucidan incarnations. Cited 
before the public tribunal, Scipio twice attempted to defend himself, 
by alluding to his previous public services, but this being deemed 
insufficient, he was charged a third time, when he absented himself 
on the plea of sickness, and soon afterwards disappeared from public 
life and the pages of history. 

At about the same time that Rome thus attempted to furnish a 
divinity to Spain, she succeeded in imposing one upon conquered 
Arcanania and Epirus, A. U. 555. This was Titus Quinctius Flami- 
ninus ", the same who was afterwards employed to murder the aged 
and defenceless Hannibal, and whose brother Lucius enlivened his 
banqueting hall and entertained his pathics by ordering his prisoners 
to be decapitated in their presence. The degraded inhabitants of 
Chalcis, to appease the truculent Titus, rededicated their Gymnasium 
to " Titus and Hercules " and the Delphinium to "Titus and Apollo "; 
they promoted Titus to the rank of a deity, and either they or the 
Epirotes appointed a priest of Titus to conduct the impious services 
and sacrifices which they had decreed to him as their new patron saint. 
They also composed a sacred hymn in his honour, a portion of which 
the faithful Plutarch has inscribed upon his immortal pages. ^* 

After the downfall of Carthage, Rome, whose dominion had hith- 
erto been restricted to Italy and Greece, rapidly became a continental 
power. Her arms not only extended over Spain but penetrated into 
Asia; and a number of petty states, whose allegiance had previously 
been paid to Persia or Greece, now became tributary to the Republic. 
These circumstances induced Sylla, when he became Dictator and 
Autocrat of what was now virtually the Roman empire, and therefore 
the superior Lord over the petty gods of Greece and Asia, to covet 
for himself a similar exaltation. Sylla was born B. C. 138 and died 
B.C. 78. The mysterious Ludi Saeculares (a survival of the Indian, 
Chaldean and Etruscan mythologies, but whose origin and ritual 
were only alluded to in the sacredly guarded Sibylline scriptures) 

2' The name of Flami-ninus, suggests the Flamen of Ninus and some association 
with the Chaldean Apollo. 2® Plutarch, in vita, 419-20. 



EASTERN AND WESTERN INCARNATIONS. 2$ 

were to recur in the course of a few years. Sylla availed himself of 
this circumstance to pretend that he was the Sacred Object in whose 
honour these mystic ceremonies were to be performed. This preten- 
sion was supported by the Etruscan augurs, belonging to the temple 
of Bellona, who interpreted the miracle of a mysterious trumpet- 
sound from the skies, by saying that it portended a New Age and 
Regeneration of the World. They remarked that there were eight 
great ages or cycles; that heaven had allotted to each its time; that 
this was limited by the cycle of the Great Year; and that when each 
cycle was nearly spent, the new one was announced by some won- 
drous sign, either from heaven or earth. The seventh cycle was 
then passing; the eighth was soon to come. '' But though Sylla con- 
demned myriads of his countrymen to the sword, he could not bend 
the minds of his followers to this design; and prudently recognizing 
its untimeliness, he quietly let it drop, and shortly afterward retired 
into private life. In aspiring to the godship, he styled himself Felix, 
the Happy, or the Harbinger of Happiness, and Epaphroditus, the 
Favorite of Venus; but for all this, the p\an would not work. " 

Quintus Sertorius was born about B. C. 125, of a respectable Ro- 
man family of Nursia in the Sabine country, near the head waters of 
the Arno. " He was educated for the bar, but his military qualities 
having won him distinction in the campaign against the Cimbri, he 
was offered a command by Marius and took sides with that general 
in the civil wars that followed. After the defeat of Marius, Sertorius 
went to Spain, where he raised a force of rebellious Romans and na- 
tive provincials, with which he kept the field for several years, 
successfully resisting the arms of Sylla's generals, Metellus and 
Pompey. It is alleged that in order to augment his influence with 
the Spaniards, Sertorius pretended that he was the miraculous progeny 
of the Deity, by the virgin Rhea ; and that a white fawn, which always 
accompanied him, was the agent of communications vouchsafed to 
to him from heaven, B. C. 78. He appears to have been a member 
of the Dionysian cult and a believer in the Eleusinian mysteries, for 
he was allied with Mithridates of Pontus, where that cult was in uni- 

39 Plutarch, in Sylla. Michelet has alluded to this circumstance, only to deprive it 
of all significance. The eight ages are from the eight gods; the most ancient form 
of the Etruscan religion. 

•*" Plutarch, in vita; Pausanias, in, 66 and 78. 

•" Sertorius was born exactly one ludi sseculares previous to the apotheosis of Au- 
gustus. This circumstance derives its significance from the suspicion that the altera- 
tion of the Roman calendar by Augustus was anticipated to some extent by Sylla. 



24 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

versal esteem, (Florus, III, 5.) He was also in communication 
with the Bacchic party in Italy. Sertorius was treacherously stabbed 
to death B.C. 73, by the Twelve members of his council or "senate," 
who upon the instigation of Perpenna had invited him to supper with 
that object; and thus ended another Roman incarnation. " Let us 
now turn to the Orient. 

The Bralwiinical Year of the re-incarnation of les Chrishna was 
B, C. 548, 470, 495 or 485, according as we follow the chronology of 
India, Augustan Rome, Greek Christian Rome, or Catholic Christian 
Rome. Gebel-Eisis, or Zalmosis, was "a native deity among the 
Getse" of Thracia, who taught the immortality of the soul, gave laws 
to the Getae, disappeared in a subterranean abode for three years, 
was lamented as dead and yet was resurrected and returned to life 
again. " Festivals with human sacrifices were offered to him every 
fifth year. " Gebel-Eisis is probably identical with the Hesus of the 
Gauls, B. C. 470, which was the epoch of the Druidical 30-year 
cycles recorded in Pliny. '•^ The Gauls (Gallaicans) are mentioned 
by Herodotus as having "anciently" occupied Samothracian Greece, 
near the river LTssus. " Their seaport (now inland) was Ismarus. 
In B. C. 390-85 vast bodies of western Gauls overran Greece, plun- 
dered the temple of Delphi and marched in a sort of crusade to their 
holy land of Maryandynia, where many of them remained. Simon Pel- 
loutier. Hist. Celt., V, 15, Rigordius in L'Escaloperius, Theol. Vet. 
Gall., X, and Andre Duschesne, Antiq. des Villes, 292-6, all agree 
that the Virgo Paritura (the mother of Hesus) was worshipped in Gaul 
centuries before the Christian sera. A Druidical altar of a remote 
period showing a bas-relief of Hesus cutting the mistletoe, is now in 
the Cluny Museum. The Passion flower was also connected with this 
cult. *' So was the cross. Diodorus Siculus, who flourished B. C. 44, 
says the Gauls wore gold crosses on their breasts. ** The Indian 
les Chrishna, the Thracian Eisis, the Gaulish Hesus, the Herichrishna 
of Arrian, c. VIII, and the Hesus of Lucan, "Phar.," I, 445, to- 
gether with uiEsar, Esa, Ma-Hesa, and Har-Esa, were evidently re- 
garded by Rev. G. S. Faber, (Pagan Idol.), as the same. The Druid- 
ical cult of Hesus was probably introduced into Rome before B. C. 
97 ; for in that year the Senate passed an act forbidding the human 
sacrifices which were peculiar to that cult. 

** Plutarch, in vita, ^^ Diodorus, Book r, 

*^ Herodotus, Mel., 93-96. ^^ Pliny, N. H.. xvi, 95, 

** Herod., Polymnia, 108. ^'i Pliny, N. H., xxiv, 63. 

**Diod. Sic, V, 2. 



EASTERN AND WESTERN INCARNATIONS. 25 

The Brahmo-Buddhic year of the incarnation of Salivahana, or re- 
incarnation of les Chrishna, is A. D. i, B. C. 78, or B. C. 63, accord- 
ing as we follow the chronology of India, Augustan Rome, or Catholic 
Christian Rome. Salivahana's celestial father was lesnu; his puta- 
tive father was Taishaca, the carpenter; his virgin mother was Maia; 
his star, the messianic. He was miraculously born on Houli, or 
Chaitra ist, which, in the lunar calendar of India, fell on the same day 
as the Roman Palilia and the Christian Easter. His advent was fore- 
told by the astrologers ; it appears in the Cumarica Chandra. He was 
born in a cottage, among shepherds, but was immediately recognized 
by seers as the Expected One. His infant head was rayed; his com- 
plexion was black; his hair was woolly. He performed numerous 
miracles, fasted forty days, had twelve disciples, was persecuted by 
Vicramaditya and, overcoming him, assumed his name. At length 
he was condemned for his leveling doctrines, and died upon the cross, 
at the vernal equinox, upon which occasion the sun was eclipsed. He 
descended to hell, released the condemned, remained there three 
days and nights, rose again and ascended to heaven. His principal 
sacrament was baptism; his symbols were the cross and svastica; and 
his zodion the Fishes. 

We shall presently see in what respect and in what manner these 
incarnations, real or mythical, influenced the history of Rome and 
through it, that of the Middle Ages. 



}g 



CHAPTER III. 

THE WORSHIP OF CESAR. 

Deification of Julius Cssar — Circumstances which led to it — Sacred empires in other 
countries and in archaic Rome — Example of Alexander the Great — Assumption of di- 
vinity by Julius Caesar — The worship of Augustus as the Son of God was afterwards 
added to that of Julius — Eventually it superceded it — Sacred titles of Augustus — Tem- 
ples of Augustus — Priests — Sanctuaries — Altars — Sacrifices — Sacred coins — Month of 
August — Augustan worship supported by Tiberius — Emperor-worship was the first arti- 
cle of the Imperial Constitution until the establishment of Christianity — After the sa- 
cred character of the Emperor was lost, the sacred character of the Empire remained. 

SUCCESSFUL or abortive, real or imaginary, all these various 
incarnations had this to do with the history of the Middle Ages : 
they prepared the way for, and led up to that Sacerdotal empire, or 
hierarchy, which was established by Julius Caesar and Augustus, and; 
whose institutes largely governed the inhabitants of Christian Europe 
until after the 13th century. In some respects, as we shall see, they 
govern them yet. 

The Sacerdotal empire was not solely due to the Civil wars ; it was 
the natural fruit of all the circumstances of the time.' Rome was no 
longer a small commonwealth of free citizens, rendered more or less 
equal in rank by a substantial equality of fortune, attainments and 
political power. It had become a populous and unwieldy empire, 
composed of many conquered nations and tribes, differing in race, 
religion, language, history and degrees of social development. The 
republican constitution, which had sufficiently well fitted the infancy 
of this state, and which, had the state grown less rapidly, might have 
been gradually altered to suit its greatly altered manhood, was, under 
the circumstances, antequated and useless, as a means of repressing 
disorder, or preserving the peace. This constitution had been over- 
thrown by Marius and Sylla. The Civil Wars had supplemented the 
existing orders of priests, patricians, plebians and slaves, with what 
was substantially a new social caste, the equites, or knights — the fu- 
ture farmers of the revenues and the lords of feudal manors, . When 

' " Caesar is no less under the control of circumstances than we are under the con- 
trol of Caesar." Letter of Cicero to Papirius P^tus, dated A. U. 707? 



THE WORSHIP OF CAESAR. Z"] 

to the already vast territorial possessions of the Commonwealth were 
afterwards added nearly the whole of Transalpine Europe, and of 
Asia Minor and Egypt, the republican constitution utterly broke down. 
The year that saw Pompey invested with the supreme power of the 
Roman State, added further dignities and privileges to the new order 
of aristocrats. ^ These developments of caste were sure presages of 
the Empire. ^ 

In both of the last dictatorships all the civil powers of the State 
had been entrusted to one man, in the hope of securing order and 
tranquility; in both cases the trust had failed to secure its object. 
To keep together so vast an empire, to assimilate under one govern- 
ment such heterogeneous populations as had recently been brought 
under its sway; to command the respect of distant kings; to curb 
the ambition and repress the avarice of proconsuls who had become 
mightier than kings; and to conserve the private fortunes that had 
been carved out of the dying republic; some greater elements of 
power and authority and some more efficacious means of subordina- 
tion were required to be wielded at Rome than those which had failed 
in the hands of Sylla and Pompey. Take, for example, the case of 
Parthia. This state had formerly been subject successively to the 
divine monarchs of Media, Persia and Syro-Macedonia: it had eman- 
cipated itself from their controul ; it had deified its own sovereigns and 
these had become subject to a Roman proconsul. The involution of 
heavenly rank therefore stood as follows: the sovereign of Media was 
a god; the sovereign of Persia was a higher god, because he had over- 
thrown the former one and substituted himself in his place as an ob- 
ject of worship. For a similar reason the Seleucidse and Arsacidae 
were gods, of still higher rank, until we come to Pompey, who was 
by parity of reasoning the highest of gods, that is to say, the god of 
gods, because he overthrew the entire succession of these divinities; 
he was mightier than them all. 

The additional powers and discipline which for these reasons were 
needed to maintain the ascendancy of Rome were found in the pecu- 

^Dio., XXXVI, 25; Juv., Ill, 159; XIV, 324; Adams, 21. 

^ So far was Cicero from sharing this opinion that he actually regarded the new or- 
der of nobles, when they should unite with the ancient noblesse of the Senate, as an 
additional guarantee for the permanency and security of the Republic. Cicero, how- 
ever, as his letters abundantly prove, was a poor politician. Indeed this Upas tree 
of caste grew so rapidly that, in his second philipic, he was obliged to confess that 
during his own lifetime he had witnessed the Dictatorship of Sylla, the Lordship of 
Cinna, and the Monarchy of Caesar. But even here his vision was very limited; it was 
not a Monarchy, but an Hierarchy, that had giown up under his eyes, Orat,, 11. 105. 



28 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

liar organization and privileges of the Sacred college and in the mys- 
teries of religion. These the ambitious and unscrupulous Caesar has- 
tened to seize with the office of high-priest and the assumption of 
sacerdotal powers, which, in proportion as they exceeded the attrib- 
utes of earthly kings, rivalled those of gods. To this discipline and 
subordination was added that moral influence which the church alone 
could wield, the influence of blind faith, of religious myths and super- 
stition, the respect for ecclesiastical displeasure, the fear of commit- 
ting sacrilege, and the dread of excommunication and anathema. * 
These are elements of power and government which no statesman, 
in any age, can afford to despise, and which we may feel assured were 
not permitted to lie unused by so profound a politician as Julius 
Caesar. The example of other states may also have contributed to 
bring about the Roman hierarchy. Hindostan, China, Japan, Persia, 
Chaldea, Egypt, Greece, Etruria and- numerous other states of an- 
tiquity had been hierarchies. Archaic Rome itself had been an hier- 
archy. Gaul was an hierarchy. Many of these hierarchies survived 
to Caesar's time, and some of them, although all were decaying, were 
among the richest and most populous states then in existence. 

Caesar has left us in no doubt with regard to his design. The con- 
quest of India by Alexander had brought anew to the western world 
the entire flood of Brahminical myths. ^ The eleventh, a supplement- 
ary incarnation of Vishnu (zodion of Pisces) was at hand, and Caesar, 
(who, among his many gifts, was an accomplished master of astrol- 
ogy,) had evidently determined to become its hero, for he publicly 
and ostentatiously proclaimed his descent from the goddess Maria or 
Venus, and attested his official acts with a seal which bore her effigy. 
Marcus Coelius, writing to Cicero in A. U. 704, alluded to Caesar as 
" our heavenly-descended chief," a proof that such was the character 
of his pretensions.- ° But there are many more proofs to come. Caes- 
ar's further plans were cut short by the dagger of his friend Brutus, 
but they are clearly discernible in the constitution which was devel- 
oped by his adopted son, Augustus, and which, beyond some impair- 
ment of the first article, continued to remain essentially the funda- 
mental law of the whole empire, until the Moslem revolt in the sev- 
enth century withdrew the eastern provinces from Rome, the revolt 
of the bishops of Rome in the eighth century withdrew the western 

* Cicero, de Legibus, 11, 7. 

^ It is to these myths, many of which reached the Romans through Assyria, that 
Tacitus seems to allude by the term "judicial astrology." Annals, 11, 27, passim. 

* Suet, Jul., vi; Dio., xliv; Melmoth's Letters of Cicero, vii, 7. 



THE WORSHIP OF CiESAR. 



29 



provinces, and the Latin conquest of Constantinople in the 13th cen- 
tury destroyed all that was left of the ancient imperial authority. 

The first and most important article in the constitution of this 
empire was the extraordinary one of the Emperor's deification. Both 
in Spain and Gaul Cssar must have heard of Hesus, the Messiah, 
whose effigy stood at every cross-road, whose crosses were worn upon 
the breast of every warrior, and whose second coming, which had 
been long predicted by the Druid astrologers, coincided very closely 
with the period of his own invasion of those countries. Indeed, it is 
not at all improbable that, like Musa, Pizarro and Cortes, of later 
ages, he made use of this superstition to represent himself or permit 
himself to be regarded as the Expected One, in order to render his 
march of conquest the more easy and rapid. However this may be, it 
was probably less the imaginary incarnation of Hesus than the actual 
example of Alexander which afforded to Julius Csesar the precedent 
which he followed in his own deification. " When he was in Spain he 
bestowed his leisure hours in reading the history of Alexander, and 
was so much affected by it that he sat pensive a long time, and being 
asked the reason, he said, * Is it not sufficient cause for concern to re- 
flect that Alexander at my age reigned over numerous conquered 
countries, whilst I, as yet, have not one glorious achievement to 
boast?' "' Not only the example of Alexander, but the similarity of 
circumstances, helped to make a divinity of Caesar. After the battle 
of Pharsalia the world was at his feet; and among the numerous po- 
tentates who were swayed by his nod were many who were themselves 
gods, and, as such, were worshipped by their degraded subjects. " 

From Pharsalia Caesar went to Egypt. He arrived in Alexandria 
October 6th, B. C. 48, and remained there until the month of March.* 
It was during this interval that, following in the footsteps of the 
Macedonian conqueror, he permitted himself, on Brumalia, or the 
winter solstice, A. U. 706, to be deified in the temple of Jupiter Am- 
nion and hailed by its subservient priests as the Son of God, " and it 

' Plutarch, in Julius Cseasar. The official seal of Augustus was an effigy of Alex- 
ander the Great. Suetonius, in Aug., 49. 

* In after times similar empires, whose Asiatic origin is plainly stamped upon their 
religious remains, were discovered and destroyed by the astonished Spaniards in dis- 
tant Mexico and Peru. Mr. Bryce (Holy Roman Empire, 251,) notices the resemblance 
between the sacred empires of the Csesars and the Caliphs, but omits to mention the 
most important respect in which they differed, namely, in the deification and adora- 
tion of the sovereign. * Simcox. 

"^ It was customary with the pagan Romans to bestow a new name upon those who 
were honoured with the rites of deification, as afterwards it was with the Christians to 



30 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

was in this same temple, after his death and pretended ascension to 
heaven, (of which more anon,) that Octavlus, the Augustus, his 
adopted son and successor, paid him the reverence due to God the 
Father. Caesar returned to Rome through Syria, and on the way he 
stopped at Piscenus, or Pesinus, in Galatia, the seat of the religion 
of Maia, Mother of the Gods. Here, if we can place any faith in the 
accusation which both Cicero aad Brutus assisted to repel, his assas- 
sination was planned (though the plan miscarried) by Deiotaurus, the 
sacred king of the Galatians. " However, it was not in Galatia that 
a tragic and untimely death was destined to overtake him, but in 
Rome. 

The assumption of an heavenly origin entirely changed the char- 
acter and demeanour of Julius. Upon his return to the capitol he 
became difficult of access and was rarely seen in public, except when 
affairs of state rendered it necessary for him to consult with the pat- 
ricians of the Senate. He placed his own statue on a sculptured 
horse which had once supported the figure of Alexander the Great. 
This was in front of the temple of Venus Genetrix. " Other statues 
of himself were placed among those of the gods in the various tem- 
ples and carried in the processions of the circus. Even these tokens 
scarced sufficed to absorb that religious fervour and popular reverence 
for his person and name, which was soon to become the scandal of 
the provinces and the watchword for assassination in the capital. He 
was presented with sacred vestments, with a sacred image of himself 
to be borne in his chariot, with a sacred throne and a sacred bed." 
To mark the sacred character of his residence it was surmounted by 
a steeple. This architectural device was an Egyptian symbol of eccle- 
siastical and sacerdotal authority, the Roman name for which was 
fastigium. "Divus Julius habuit pulvinar, simulacrum, fastigium, 

those who were canonized as saints. On this occasion Caius received the sacerdotal 
name of Julus, or Julius, really copied from the Indian Houli, but feigned to be taken 
from Julius, the son of ^neas, from whom his family subsequently affected to trace 
their descent. In all the earlier works referring to him he is called Caius Caesar, and 
sometimes simply Caius. Mr. Iliggins has collected many curious observations re- 
lating to the name of Julius, which he connects with the festival of Yule and the cus- 
tom of the Yule-log. Brumalia is from Brouma, or Brumess, one of the names or 
titles of Bacchus. This deity, whom the medieval monks consigned to revelry and in- 
toxication, was anciently worshipped as the pure, the chaste, the joyous Messiah. He 
was the Son of God, immaculately conceived by the virgin Maia, or Ceres, sometimes 
called Semele. •' Cicero, Letters, iii, 25; Orat. pro Deiotaurus. 

'^ Lanciani, " Pagan and Christian Rome," p. 54. 

'^ Suet., in Jul., 76: App., Bell. Civ., in, p. 494. 



THE WORSHIP OF C^SAR. 31 

flaminem, etc." The god Julius had shrines, an image, a Steeple, 
priests, and so on. '* The steeple of the Regia probably also con- 
tained a chime of bells like the temple of Jupiter. '^ Speaking of the 
omens that, it was believed, preceded the assassination of Julius, 
Plutarch, in his life of that divinity, says, " Calphurnia dreamed that 
the steeple fell down, which, according to Livy, the Senate ordered 
to be erected upon Caesar's residence, by way of distinction."*" The 
temples of Julius Caesar bore the appellation of Heroum Juleum, or 
Julian chapels, and contained his effigy and that of Venus, Mother of 
God. '■^ "On certain occasions, in the exercise of his high pontifical 
office, he appeared in all the pomp of the Babylonian costume, in 
robes of scarlet, with the Crosier in his hand, wearing the Mitre and 
bearing the Keys." " 

Of the numerous statues made of him at, or shortly after, this pe- 
riod, but few have survived the devastation of the iconoclasts, or the 
corroding hand of time. Among them is the magnificent bust, which 
still adorns the Pontifical palace at Rome. Upon the head of the 
deity is seen the sacred mantle, or peplum, which marks his heav- 
enly character. 

When the tremendous commotion caused by the death of Julius 
Caesar had spent itself in civil wars, and in the firm establishment of 
the Messianic religion and ritual, Augustus ascended the sacred 
throne of his martyred sire and was in turn addressed as the Son of 
God, whilst Julius was worshipped as the Father. " The flamens of 
the Sacred college erected and consecrated to the worship of Julius 
Caesar a magnificent temple in Rome, and for its services, as well as 
for those of the provincial temples which might be consecrated to 
the same god, they organized a body of priests called the Julii, or 
Juliani. '"' These priests were selected from the most ancient order, 
the Luperci, of whom Ovid says that they were instituted by Evan- 
der, ^^ and to which order none could belong but the members of 
noble families. This priesthood was not abolished until the time of 
Anastasius Silentiarius in the sixthcentury ; " so that as Juliaai tliey 

"Cic, II Philipic, (Orat., n,io6.) '^ Suet., Aug., 91. 

"* Plut., in vita; Pliny, xxxv, 12, s. 45; xxxvi, 5; Pans., 54; and Cic. Flor., iv, 2. 
" Rev, A. Herbert, " Nimrod," i, 455. '^ Rev. A. Hislop, " Two Babylons," p. 241. 
'' Manilius, " Astronomica," quoted farther on; Ovid, Fasti, iii, 155-9. 
''^Dio., XLVii, 18; Dio. Cas., 45; Plut., in Rom.; Virgil, Aen., viil, 663. 
^^ Fasti, II, 279; see also Livy, i, 5. 

^'^ So says Onuphrius Panvinius, a learned Augustine monk of Verona, 1529-6S, the 
author of the " Lives of the Popes " and other works. 



32 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

held together from first to last for nearly six hundred years. The 
first bishop or chief priest of the Julian cult was Marc Antony. " No 
person who fled to a temple of Julius for sanctuary could be taken 
from it for punishment, a privilege which had never been granted 
before, not even to the temples and sanctuaries of Jupiter. Except 
when Augustus caused the son of Marc Antony to be dragged from 
one and slain, " the shrines of Julius were always regarded as invio- 
lable. ^^ Under the Triumvirate and during the early portion of the 
reign of Augustus, the worship of Julius Caesar and the erection of 
temples, sanctuaries, shrines and altars consecrated to this worship 
was carried to all parts of the empire and enforced by precept, ex- 
ample and military power. Upon these altars costly offerings and 
bloody sacrifices were made. One of the latter consisted of 300 
senators and equites, who were coldly slaughtered by order of Au- 
gustus upon the ides of March, A. U. 713, on a Julian altar at Peru- 
gia, to propitiate the god Divus Julius. ^^ Official oaths were formu- 
lated in the name of Julius Caesar, and to violate them was deemed 
a more heinous crime and punished with greater severity than any 
other perjury. " 

The naming of one of the months of the year after the god Julius, 
which was done during the consulship of Marc Antony, is, by itself, 
no evidence of his deification; but the practice of other nations, the 
precedent afforded by the Athenian god Demetrius, the subsequent 
naming of a month after the deified Augustus, and the fact that the 
Romans never adopted any names in place of the ancient numerical 
names of the months, except the names of gods, lends it great sig- 
nificance. Many attempts were made to name the months after 
various emperors who followed Augustus, but they all failed. April 
was for a brief time called Neronius; May, Claudius; and June, Ger- 
manicus. " Tiberius, who refused to be deified, or worshipped as a 

*^ " As Jove, as Mars, as Quirinus have their priests, so is Marc Antony priest of 
the god Julius." "Est ergo flamen, ut Jovi, ut Marti, ut Quirino, sic Divo Julio, 
Marcus Antonius." Cicero, II Philipic. 

-■*Suet., Aug., 17, "Adams, 264, 

'^ Suet., Aug., i5;Dio., XLViii, 14; Seneca de Clem., i, ii; App. de Bell. Civ., lib.. 
V. This horrible rite celebrated the conclusion of the Civil War, the Ascension of Julius 
to Heaven and the Advent of Augustus as the Prince of Peace. In the time of Julius 
Ceesar human sacrifices were only made to Mars; in that of Augustus they were made 
to Julius the Father. 

" Dio., XIV, 6 and 50; Tac, Ann., i, 73; Codex, iv, i, 2; Codex, 11, 4, 41; Digest, 
XII, 2, 13; TertuU. Apol., 18; Cicero de Legibus, Jl, 7. 

2^ Tacitus, Ann., xv, 12 and 74. 



THE WORSHIP OF CAESAR. 33 

god, also refused to permit his name to be substituted for Novem- 
ber. ^' 

In remote times the Roman year was divided into ten months, 
named Primus, Secundus, Tertius, Quartus, Quintilis, Sextilis, Sep- 
tembris, Octobris, Novembrisand Decembris, theyear beginning with 
the vernal equinox, which was made to fall on the first day of March 
and the months containing ^6 days each. After the adoption of the 
gods Mars, Aphrodite, Maia and Juno into the Roman pantheon 
their names were conferred upon the first four months of the year, 
instead of Primus, Secundus, Tertius and Quartus. This calendar 
was reformed by the Decemvirs, in the sacred name of *'Numa. " 
They divided the year into 12 months with intercalary days and con- 
ferred upon the supplementary months the names of the gods Janus 
and Februus. ^^ When Julius Ccesar was deified his name was given to 
what was originally the fifth month of the year, or Quintilis. When 
Octavius Augustus Caesar was deified his sacerdotal name was given 
to the original sixth month, or Sextilis. ^* The remaining months 
still bear their ancient ordinal names. 

If all other evidences had perished, the names of the months alone 
would have been sufficient to afford a clue to the worship of Julius 
Caesar. The inveteracy of custom, the respect for tradition, the prac- 
tical inconvenience that arises from changes of any kind, all combine 
to resist innovation, so that when innovation does occur, as in the case 
of changed names of the months, it may be tolerably certain that pow- 
erful motives or irresistible influences lurk beneath. If such be the 
case, even at the present time, when intelligence is universally dif- 
fused and public opinion is guided by an unfettered press, it may be 
imagined how much more emphatically it was the case when mankind 
was steeped in superstition, when every life was in danger, and when 
innovation had to resist not only the inveteracy of custom, but the 
mandates of revengeful and absolute power. ''^ 

*' In 796, after Pope Leo III. had sent the keys and standard of Rome and other 
tokens of his submission to Charlemagne, the latter gave twelve German names to the 
months of the year, but they all fell flat; the people would not accept them. 

^^ Brumalia, or the winter solstice, was anciently the first day of the year. Begin- 
ning the year a week after the winter solstice was an innovation. 

^' Macrobius, Sat., i, 12, says the change was made in the Senate on motion of the 
tribune Pacuvius and leaves us the inference that it was done during the lifetime of 
Augustus. The inference is corroborated by John of Nikios. 

^^ Other attempts have been made both in ancient and modern times to change the 
Roman names of the months, but they all proved abortive. 



34 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

If the reader is surprised and shocked at the impiety of a religion 
such as we have described, let it be remembered that the minds of 
the Romans were prepared for it by the familiar worship of the Lares 
or the manes of their ancestors; '^ by the depravity which they them- 
selves had ascribed to many of their Homeric gods; by the Messianic 
incarnations which had gone before, among them that of their own 
Janus Quirinus; " and especially by the nearer incarnations and wor- 
ship of Alexander the Great, Demetrius Poliorcetes and Titus Flam- 
ininus; by the anarchy, bloodshed and brutalizing triumphs'' and 
spectacles which civil wars and foreign conquests had recently brought 
beneath their eyes;'* by the transcendent services, both military and 
civil, which Julius had rendered to the State; and by his illustrious 
descent, his alleged miraculous birth," his brilliant and varied attain- 
ments, '* his extraordinary courage and sagacity, his personal mag- 
netism, his profuse liberality, the magnificence and glamour of his 
surroundings and the legitimate authority he wielded both as sover- 
eign and high-priest. '^ Even Pompey's triumph had helped to pave 
the way for the deification of his rival and successor. Among the 
kings who had paid homage to Pompey was that scion of the Arsa- 

^^ Virgil, Aeneid, ix, 255; Tooke's Pantheon, 279. 

^ Julius Proculus swore that Romulus appeared to him and ordered him to inform 
the Senate that he had been called to the assembly of the gods, and that sacrifices 
should be made to him under the name of Quirinus. Plutarch, in Rom.; Livy, i, 16. 
and Dio. Halicar. The figures of Romulus appear clad in the trabea, a robe of state, 
which implies an ecclesiastical as well as secular dignity. The lituus, or staff of augury, 
in his hand, survives in the crosier. Bell's Pantheon. 

^* The elation produced by a military triumph was such as to render it necessary to 
place behind the victor's back, a slave, whose office it was to remind him that he was 
but a mortal! Pliny, xxiii, i, p. 4. "Was it the victor's elation, or a popular dread 
of the example set by Scipio, Sylla, and Pompey? 

^^ The people of Paris, scarcely over a century ago, worshipped a Goddess of Rea- 
son, personified by a beautiful young woman. 

^■' Julius Caesar was born exactly 658 years, less ten years, after the incarnation of 
Nabon-Issus. This interval was the celebrated astrological cycle or one-tenth of the 
annualized cycle of the moon's node, which was the proper time for the recurrence of 
an incarnation. The 8era of Mahomet is exactly 658 years, plus ten years after the 
deification of Caesar. These differences of ten years may be due to the subsequent 
alteration of the Alexandrian sera, alluded to elsewhere in this work. The accepted 
year of Cesar's birth and that of Mahomet's Flight, were probably both "adjusted " 
by the astrologers. 

*® "Caesar had capacity, sense, memory, learning, foresight, reflection and spirit." 
Cic, II Phil., 45. 

^* " The deified Julius, a most perfect specimen, as well of the divinity of heaven, 
as of the human intellect." Valerius Maximus, vin, 2. 



THE WORSHIP OF C^SAR. 35 

cides, whose arrogant line had exacted a worship due alone to the 
Creator. Pompey, as though persuaded that no one less than a god 
could receive homage from a god, caused an image of himself, in gold 
and pearls, to be carried in the most brilliant procession that the 
world ever saw; leaving his son Sextus to complete the impious pre- 
tension which the father had perhaps merely suggested. " 

The Roman dominion was no longer Italy, no longer Europe, but 
the earth. At the feet of Pompey 12 tributary kings had laid their 
crowns; at the tread of the Julian legions the earth seemed to trem- 
ble and empires fell to pieces. Love, admiration, respect, venera- 
tion, are feelings which failed to express the idolatry of a sensuous 
and embruted population, toward a being so exalted, so gifted, so 
brilliant, so god-like, above all, so powerful, as Julius Csesar, whose 
slightest word sufficed to condemn a kingdom to destruction, whose 
merest glance of favour meant fortune, preferment, power, opportu- 
nity, livings, endowments, license, satiety, all that men, that hiero- 
phants, that nations, coveted. Adoration was alone sufficient to ex- 
express the feelings of the Roman populace toward him who reigned 
over the vast empire which they had acquired and the innumerable 
kingdoms they had enslaved. But a few years later Tiberius was 
actually upbraided because he refused to be deified and because he 
persisted in reminding the Romans that he was but a mortal. " We 
may be certain that Julius had little need to command deification; 
his crime was that he permitted and accepted it. 

If, after all these evidences and considerations, the prevalence of 
this form of anthropomorphism should still excite his incredulity, let 
th reader turn to a passage in Ezekiel, and read of that prince of 
Tyre who was rebuked and devoted to destruction, because in his 
pride he claimed to be a god. Next let him open the Antiquities of 
Josephus, XIX, viii, 2, and he will learn that Agrippa, the tributary 
king of Judea, etc., under Claudius Caesar, appeared at a public fes- 
tival in Csesarea in a "garment made wholly of silver and of a text- 
ure truly wonderful, and coming into the theatre early in the day, 
when the silver of his garment, illuminated by the sun's rays, was so 
resplendent as to send a horror over those who looked intently upon 
him, his sycophants cried out, some from one place and some from 

*" Among the kings devoted to Pompey, but who survived him, was Deiotaurus of 
Galatia, whose name also implies the assumption of a divine character. The abbe 
Lenglet de Fresnoy dates the deification of Sextus Pompey as the " Son of Neptune" 
in B, C. 37. Chronol., i, 474. Neptune was the god who presided over the zodiacal 
Fishes. ^> Tac. Ann., iv, 38. 



T,6 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

another, that he was a god, and they added, ' Be thou merciful to us, 
for though we have hitherto reverenced thee only as a man, yet shall 
we henceforth own thee as superior to mortal nature.'" Unfortu- 
nately for this would-be deity, he was shortly afterwards taken with 
a colic and died in great pain, perhaps poisoned by some obscure 
Brutus of Judea. " 

It is not necessary to account for such a worship by recalling the 
depravity of the age. A country could be named where similar de- 
pravity exists to-day, yet where there is no worship of the reigning 
sovereign. It was due to faith, habit, custom, example, in short, to 
the fact that the Romans lived nearly two thousand years nearer to 
the Brahminical myth of the Incarnation than we do. Our task is to 
relate the historical fact; we leave to others the less invidious bur- 
den of its explanation; only let them take heed, in such explanation, 
of other phases of religion; of the Hanging Fakirs, the Stylites, the 
Chainwearers and Grasseaters of the imperial sera; of the Agapemonae 
of England, the Shakers and Mormons of America, and the other 
strange rites or beliefs that mankind have practised or endured. " 

*^ This story of Agrippa, or Herod, is briefly told in Acts xii, 22, where the scene, 
however, is changed to Tyre. The following example of human-worship belongs to 
the present time : 

Calcutta, June 20, 1894. — Yesterday the Queen's statue at Madras was smeared (annointed) with 
Hindu religious marks on the forehead, neck and breast. The police inquiry has resulted in the opinion 
being expressed that it was the work of a Hindu who desired to worship the statue. This is not the 
first time that such a smearing (annointing) has taken place. Some time ago a carpenter was caught in 
the act of decorating the statue with garlands, and marks similar to those now found were detected on 
that occasion. He said that he was worshipping the Great Maharanee, who, he hoped, would protect 
him and give him plenty of work. The Inspector of Police, in whose division the statue is situated, 
says that he himself has noticed people burning incense, breaking cocoanuts, and prostrating themselves 
in worship before it. Correspondence London Times. 

*^ See my Essay on " The Druses of Galilee." Materials for a history of the Druses 
will be found in Ezekiel, Josephus, Pausanias, De Sacy, Didron, Churchill and other 
works. The Jezites, an ancient "Christian sect "in Persia, are described by Noel, ar- 
ticle " Jezd." The Stylites, Grasseaters, and other "Christian " sects of a later period 
are mentioned in most of the early ecclesiastical "histories." The Galilean Chainwearers 
are described by the Emperor Julian, in the fragment preserved by Cyril of Alexan- 
dria. A modern incarnation of the deity in the kingdom of Ava is mentioned by 
Upham. A re-incarnation of Salivahana was to "come off" in 1895. So late as 1781, 
Sir William Hamilton, the English ambassador to the Court of Naples, found that 
phallic symbols were publicly worshipped in the Christian churches of Isneria and 
Daniano. Meredith's pages are crowded with evidences on this subject. The images 
of the Sibyls were retained in the Christian church of Sienna. Bell's Pantheon, li, 237. 
The Agapemonae was an English Christian sect of the present century, whose abom- 
inable rites are alluded to by the Rev. Mr. Baring-Gould. For the blasphemous 
monkish tale of the marriage of St. Dunstan's mother to the Almighty, see Brady's 
Clavis Calendaria, i, 388. 



THE WORSHIP OF C^SAR. 37 

As in the case of other successful deifications or apotheoses, that 
of Julius Caesar was made the beginning of a new sera. This one be- 
gan with the date of his deification in the temple of Jupiter Ammon, 
on the winter solstice of the year B. C. 48. As it coincided closely 
with the date of the battle of Pharsalia, Tacitus and other pagan dis- 
senters from Julianism, who could not change the sera, called it, or 
have been made by their redactors to call it, the sera of that battle; 
and as it also coincided within a year or two of the alleged freedom 
of Antioch, the Christian monks, who could not change it, called it 
by the name of that event. As such it was employed by the putative 
Evagrius, in the sixth century, and explained away by Pope Gregory 
XIII. in the i6th century. " 

Even after the deification of Julius was ratified by the senate of 
Rome, two years later, the Julian sera was reckoned from the original 
deification, and, as such, it was introduced into all parts of the em- 
pire, with, possibly, the exception of Antioch, for this exception is 
by no means certain. This subject, as well as the absence of all men- 
tion of the Christian sera by the Christian writers down to the pontifi- 
cate of Gregory II., has received attention in another place. 

The worship of Divus Julius was encouraged and supported both 
by the Triumvirate, who assumed the government of the Roman world 
after his death, and by Octavius, the Augustus, who succeeded the 
Triumvirate. Nay more, Augustus had the address to cause his own 
worship to be added to that of Julius. The latter was now impiously 
addressed as the Supreme Being, the former became the Son of God, 
and as such he is announced upon his coins and other monuments. 
But this did not last long. Even the Son of God did not appear to 
be a title sufficiently exalted to suit the devotees of the Augustus; 
and in numerous contemporary inscriptions, both in Rome, Greece 
and Asia, he is termed Deos, or Theos, which means not the Son of 
God, nor one of the gods, but the living god, the Creator, Optimo 
Maximo. However, Divus Filius, ^sar and Quirinus seem to have 
been the titles by which Octavius himself preferred to be called. 

*■* Says Gregory: " Antioch, in honour of the emperor, fixed its sera in Caius Juli'JS 
Caesar and made this year of grace, the first," "Works," London, ed. 166=;, p. 156, 
cited in Evagrius, note to li, 12. The Holy father then admits some instances of its 
use (as though such instances were rare) and ascribes its adoption to the free preroga- 
tives of the city, secured to it by Julius Ccesar. If the granting of such freedom to 
cities was sufficient to cause a change of the oera it may be asked why is it that Antioch 
stands almost alone in this respect, and why is it that nearly all other aeras are those 
of prretended incarnations or deifications, and not of freedom conferred upon cities? 



38 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

The worship of Augustus was not, as the ecclesiastical schools have 
insinuated, a mere lip-service, a meaningless mode of saluting the 
sovereign-pontiff, an effusive form of adulation or flattery to the 
emperor of Rome ; it was the worship of a personage who was believed 
to be supernatural, omniscient, all-powerful and beneficent, the re- 
incarnation of Quirinus, the Son of the god Apollo and of the wife- 
virgin Maia; "the god whose coming was foretold by the Cumaean 
Sibyl; whose sway was to extend over the whole earth; whose Con- 
ception and Birth were both miraculous ; and whose Advent was to 
usher in the Golden Age of Peace and Plenty and to banish Sin for- 
ever. Such was his character in Rome. In Greece he was worshipped 
as Dionysos; in Egypt as Thurinus; in Iberia and Gaul as .^sar, or 
Hesus; and in Germany as Baldir; for all of these titles and many 
others will be found on his monuments, or have been preserved by 
his biographers. 

The most effective reply that can be made to those historians who 
have ignored the worship of Augustus — and who, when they have not 
concealed its evidences, have passed them over, or sought to belittle 
them — is to read a letter from one of the worshippers of this god, 
written from Tomis, a Roman outpost, near the mouths of the Dan- 
ube ""^ addressed to Graecinus, in Rome, and dated, according to our 
chronology, A. D. 15, or shortly after the death and Ascension of 
Augustus. The writer of this letter was no less a person than the 
poet Ovid, or Publius Ovidius Naso, a nobleman of the equestrian 
order, then 58 years of age and, as his other writings testify, in the 
full possession of his faculties. 

"Nor is my piety unknown: this distant land sees a shrine of our 
Lord Augustus erected in my house. Together with him stand his 
son and wife (his priestess), deities scarcely less than our Lord him- 
self ... As oft as the day arises, so often do I address my 
prayers to them, together with offerings of frankincense. Shouldst 
thou enquire, the whole of Pontus will confirm my words, and attest 
my sincerity; nor is my religion less known to strangers . 
Though fortune is not equal to my inclination in such duties, I will- 
ingly devote to this worship such means as I command . 
Caesar. Thou, who art summoned to the gods above, thou too, 
from whom nothing can be concealed, thou knowest this to be true! 

■•^ For Maia, Atia, etc., see the author's monograph on " The Mother of the Gods.'' 
■*^ The Danube was originally called the Issus; afterward, the Matous. Malte- 
Brun's Geog. 



THE WORSHIP OF CiESAR. 39 

In thy place among the stars, fixed in the arch of the skies, thou 
hearest my prayers, which I utter with anxious lips!" 

This evidence does not stand alone. Throughout all of Ovid's 
Letters, of which 36 remain to us, throughout all of his Elegies, of 
which 50 remain, throughout all his Fasti, of which six entire books 
remain, he repeatedly addresses the then living Augustus as God, or 
the Son of God, the Great Deity, the Heaven-born, the Divine, the 
Omniscient, the Beneficent, the Just, the Long-suffering, the Merciful 
God. It may serve the purposes of perversion to explain this away, 
it may afford a refuge for obstinacy or delusion to dismiss it with 
affectations of incredulity or contempt; but this is no answer to the 
fact; for fact it unquestionably is, not alone upon the testimony of 
Ovid, but upon that also of numerous other intelligent, respectable 
and even illustrious witnesses, that is to say, the testimony of Virgil, 
Horace, Manilius, Pliny, Suetonius and others. What is insisted upon 
is that, Augustus Caesar, by his contemporaries, was believed to be, 
and was actually worshipped as a god; with bell, book, candle, 
steeple, frankincense, rosary, cross, mitre, temples, priesthood, ben- 
efices and ritual; in short, with all the outward marks of superstition, 
credulity, piety and devotion. There is nothing impossible about 
this; and the evidence of this worship is so valid, circumstantial and 
overwhelming, that to refuse assent to it, is to put reason out of 
court altogether. The witnesses are not phantoms, the wild cre- 
ations of credulous minds; their writings are not anonymous patch- 
works, undated, unlocated and unsigned; they do not stand unsup- 
ported by archaeology, inscriptions, coins, calendars, or popular 
customs; on the contrary, they are corroborated and buttressed by 
all these classes of evidence. The witnesses are men of reputation, 
their writings are among the masterpieces of the world, which it 
would be impossible to imitate and difficult to alter without detection, 
whilst the monuments which support them are numbered by myriads 
and found in every conceivable locality, from the Roman slabs in 
the mosque of Ancyra, to the coins rescued from buried Pompeii; 
both of which, as well as a vast number of other inscriptions and 
coins, proclaim the divinity and universal worship of Augustus 
throughout the Roman world. 

And mark this: that in actual history great events do not occur 
alone. They appear neither unheralded nor unsung. Minor events 
start forth to presage them; others proclaim their occurrence; still 
others attest and exalt their significance; whilst a numerous progeny 
of facts remain behind to corroborate their appearance upon the 



40 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

world's Stage and to definitely mark their sera. The presages of the 
Augustan incarnation were the previous assumptions of divinity by 
Alexander the Great, the Ptolemies, the Selucidee, Demetrius Pol- 
iorcetes, the Arsacidse, Titus Quinctius Flamininus, the abortive at- 
tempts of Scipio, Sylla, Sertorius and Pompey, and the successful 
one of Julius Caesar. It was the bestowal of Csesar's empire, Spiritual 
and Temporal, upon his adopted son Augustus, that directly led to 
the worship of the latter. The assumption of divinity by the various 
sovereigns and heroes mentioned, are historical facts which no amount 
of sophistry can belittle or set aside ; they are the historical circum- 
stances that presaged and led up the worship of Augustus. In false 
history and false philosophy there is no such evolution. Take for 
example the incarnations of Nebo-Nazaru, Hesus and Salivahana. 
What preceded these fictions? Nothing. What accompanied them? 
Nothing. What followed them? Nothing, but other fictions. What 
evidences of their occurrence exists within two hundred years of the 
time assigned to them? None whatever. What valid evidence, at 
any time? None at all. They were myths of the cloisters, uncon- 
nected with any real event, fabricated centuries after the date as- 
signed to them; and supported only by forgery, imposture and alter- 
ations of the calendar. 

When the tremendous commotion caused by the assassination of 
Julius Caesar had spent itself in civil wars and in the firm establish- 
ment of the Messianic religion and ritual, when Actium waswon, and 
Egypt and Asia were reconquered, Augustus ascended the throne of 
his martyred Sire and was in turn annointed, addressed and worship- 
ped as the Son of God; whilst Julius was tacitly worshipped as the 
Father. Most of the ancient books were now destroyed; the writers 
of the old school were executed or banished; the republican calendar 
was altered; and a conclave of historians and mythological poets was 
encouraged and rewarded, who re-wrote the history of Rome and 
erected for posterity a body of elegant fiction and imposture, which 
nineteen centuries of time have not yet sufficed to wholly overthrow 
or eradicate. 

These statements are not mere opinions; they are based upon evi- 
dences so valid, so numerous and so convincing that they would tri- 
umphantly withstand the severest scrutiny of a court of law. 

According to the received chronology, Caepius, or, he who was af- 
terwards called Caius Julius Caesar Octavianus, and still later the 
Augustus, was born September 23, A. U. 692, began to reign Feb- 
ruary 26, A. U. 711 and died August 29, A. U. 768, aged 76 years 



THE WORSHIP OF C^SAR, 4I 

lacking one month. " He was the son of Maia, as she was called by- 
Horace and the inscription at Lyons, while Suetonius says her name 
was Atia, a niece of Julius Csesar. His putative father was Caius 
Octavianus; a citizen of Rome and the son of a baker. At the age 
of four years Augustus lost his father. He was then adopted by 
Phillipus and afterwards at the age of puberty by Julius Caesar, as his 

*' The chronology is based on the dates which appear in the Testament of Augustus, 
engraved on the walls of his temple at Ancyra. According to Mr. John M. Kinneir's 
"Journey through Asia Minor," ed. 1818, p. 70, this monument has been tampered 
with, therefore until the dates are corroborated by some valid monument, as yet not 
exposed to the work of forgers, they must not be regarded as conclusive, especially 
as Josephus says that Augustus died at the age of seventy-six, while Eutropius, vii, 8, 
says that he died at the age of eighty-six. The monument says "I am now in my 
seventy-sixth year," which, if Josepus is right, was the year of his death. Of course 
this is possible; but in view of the testimony of Eutropius and Kinneir, it looks sus- 
picious. The Ancyran monument says that Augustus was nineteen years of age when 
Hirtius and Pansa were consuls and when — after their mysterious death during the 
same year — he got his first consulship. This was the year following the assassination 
of Julius Caesar, or (by our chronology) A. U. 711, As it is from this year that the 
reign — not the Advent, nor the Apotheosis, nor the Ascension, but the reign — of Au- 
gustus is commonly reckoned and, as according to Josephus, he died at the age of 
seventy-six years, therefore he died in 768 and was born in 692. If the student will take 
the trouble to compare these dates with those in any modern date-book, he will observe 
several discrepancies and he will have to choose between the monument and the chro- 
nologists, Suetonius says that Augustus was born the day when the conspiracy of 
Catiline was debated in the Senate, but this does not help us, for the year of Rome 
is wanting, as indeed it is in most of the ancient works which have been submitted to 
the scrutiny of the Sacred College. Josephus evidently counts Augustus' reign from 
February 26 of the year, when, according to Tacitus, Hirtius and Pansa were con- 
suls. As it does not appear that Augustus succeeded Hirtius and Pansa on February 
26, Josephus probably derived this particular day from that of the Apotheosis of A.U. 
738. This last was the New-Year day of the Augustan Aera, which was observed 
during the lifetime of Augustus, but was afterwards superceded by an jera, the year, 
(not the day,) of which, was counted from the Ascension. It will be observed that 
Eutropius, Josephus and the Treatise on Oratory which is commonly ascribed to Taci- 
tus, all count the reign of Augustus from his first consulate, or, which is practically 
the same thing, from the deaths of Hirtius and Pansa. Although Augustus does not 
claim so much in his Testament, he begins its chronicles at the same time. Strictly 
speaking, he was at that time a consul of the republic, and that, too, with Pedius for 
his colleague. The Triumvirate had yet to be formed and dissolved; Greece, Africa 
and Asia had to be conquered; and the empire organised. Until these objects were 
achieved Augustus did not reign; and when he did reign he was careful rather to claim 
less than more authority than he had really acquired. With regard to his Aera, there 
is no evidence that it was employed earlier than his return from Syria and the celebra- 
tion of the Ludi Saeculares and Ludi Augustales. The date, February 26, is from the 
"six months and two days " of Josephus, reckoned backward from the day of Augus- 
tus' death. 



42 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

own son. When Caesar was assasinated, Augustus was still in his 
teens. When, in accordance with the Treaty of Brundusium, Au- 
gustus divided the world with Marc Antony, giving to the latter the 
Eastern, and retaining for himself Rome and the Western Empire, 
he had but barely attained the age of manhood. After the departure 
of Marc Antony, one of the first acts of Augustus was the destruction 
of Perugia, a city which refused to acknowledge his authority. The 
fall of this place was followed by the sacrificial Placation of Julius 
the Father. In this atrocious rite, some authors allege that the con- 
sul, Lucius Antony, (brother of Marc) besides Cannutius C. Flavins, 
Clodius Bithynicus, and the principal magistrates and council of 
Perugia, together with 300 senators and knights, were immolated as 
human sacrifices, upon an altar of Julius, erected for the occasion. " 
The greater part of the abominable auto da fe was executed in the 
presence of Augustus himself, whose only reply to those who im- 
plored and shrieked for mercy, was: "You must die." 

Let those who contend that the worship of Julius and Augustus 
was merely a form, ponder over this horrible event. So soon as the 
gruesome business was over, Augustus prepared for his own elevation 
to the godship. Such of the ancient literature as was not destroyed, 
was perverted, the Sibylline books " being among those preserved, 
because they were found to contain the prophecy of his Advent, which, 
according to the subservient interpretation of Virgil, was to occur 
this same year, that is to say, in the consulate of Pollio, A. U. 713, 
when the world would be at peace, the temple of Janus closed, and 
the Golden Age would begin. Unfortunately for this pretty scheme, 
Marc Antony, grown jealous of Augustus, made war upon him; and 
the temple of Janus had to be re-opened; so that the god of the 
Western world was fain to postpone his intended elevation until the 
god of the East was subdued. The memorable victory of Actium 
was won in A. U. 723. It was in this year that Herod is said to have 
paid a relief of 800 talents to Augustus, who confirmed him, for the 
second time, in his vassal kingdom of Judea; an act, which the Ro- 

•*^ Suet., in Aug. 

*^ There were ten Sibyls and ten books and ten decemviri to take charge of them. 
In Roman legend the books are mentioned in connection with Tarquin the Proud; in 
Roman history they first explicitly appear in the consulate of Lucretius, A. U. 292, 
although they are alluded to as nothing new. Livy, i, 7; iii, 10; v, 13, etc. In the 
Augustan age it was pretended that they had been destroyed during the Marsic war 
A.U. 670, whereupon new copies were collected from the Sibylline oracles throughout 
the empire and deposited by Augustus under the statue of Apollo on the Palatine 
Hill. Suet., Aug., 31; Dio., 17. 



THE WORSHIP OF CAESAR. 43 

mans called "the Grace of God," but which the Jews attributed to 
bribery at court. In the following year Augustus entered Asia and 
Egypt at the head of an immense army ; when Antony and Cleopatra, 
in despair, committed suicide. In this year the conqueror pretended 
to have opened the Suez Canal and thus placed Rome in direct com- 
munication with India; whereas, it was in fact done several years 
previously by Julius Caesar; although in the meanwhile the canal may 
have filled up with sand and have required dredging. The monument 
of Ancyra asserts that in his seventh consulate Octavius was recog- 
nised as the Augustus, or Holy one; a statement that agrees with 
Censorinus, who says that he received the title of Augustus in A. U. 
726. This was probably true as to the Orient, but it does not appear 
that the title was assumed in Rome until the year known to us as 
A. U. 738. '' 

In A. U. 730 Herod is said to have rebuilt the temple of Jerusalem 
and dedicated it to Jehovah. In the upper city he erected another 
edifice of greater magnitude, which he called the Caesarium, and 
dedicated it to Augustus. He also built a temple to Augustus in 
Strato's Tower, "which," says Josephus, "was excellent, both for 
beauty and size; and therein was a colossal image of Augustus, not 
less than that of Jupiter Olympus, which it was made to resemble." 
Herod rebuilt Samaria, renamed it Sebastos, the Greek form of Au- 
gustus, and erected therein a temple to the worship of that god. In- 
deed he repaired many places and erected temples and statues of 
Augustus in them, and called them Caesarea, Augusta and the like. 
In the 192nd four-year Olympiad, answering to A. U. 745, Herod 
even went so far in his homage of Augustus, as to revive the pana- 
geia of Jasius, or the fifty-months each of 36 days, or five-year 

^^ According to the monument at Ancyra, which was erected after Octavius had 
been consul 14 times, imperator 20 times and tribune 38 times, therefore according to 
our chronology, after A. U. 762, Octavius had been named Sebastos (at least in the 
Orient) in his sixth consulate. According to the chronology which has been supplied 
to us, this was in A. U. 724; yet Eutropius, vii, 8, says that Augustus returned to 
Rome in the 12th year from his first consulate, which agrees with A. U. 723. Cen- 
sorinus says the title of "Augustus, D. F.," was conferred by the Senate, January 16, 
in the year of his seventh consulate, when his colleague was M. Vipsanius Agrippa, 
Cos., III. This answers to our A. U. 725, or 726; so that, like Julius Caesar, Octa- 
vius appears to have been deified in Egypt first, and in Rome two years later. Some 
authors make a difference of three years between these dates. The Roman deification 
seems to have been immediately followed by the Triumph and the Scecular games of 
A. U. 73S (Censorinus), yet there are 14 or 15 years between the two dates, during 
which the history of Octavius is barren of events. 



44 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

Olympian games and to call them " Caesar's games." For the expen- 
ses of their observance he devoted certain revenues in perpetuity. 
(Josephus, Wars, xxi.) His coins were stamped with the Buddhic 
or Osirian sacred monogram p which was afterwards appropriated 
by the medieval historians of Christianity. 

After the subjection of Egypt, Augustus, at the head of vast forces, 
visited Tyre, Sidon, Samos, Ancyra, Cyzicus and other places in Asia; 
in all of which he received a homage due alone to gods. To crown 
these supernal triumphs, he recoveredfrom the Parthian king, Phraa- 
tes, the Roman standards, captured years before from Crassus: and 
thus relieved the arms of Rome from the only stain that rested upon 
them. According to the Ancyran inscription, Augustus returned from 
Syria to Rome during the consulship of Q. Lucretius Vispillo. The 
day was afterwards celebrated as Augustalia, October 12. The chro- 
nologists place this consulship in A. U. 737, whereas Eutropius says 
that Augustus returned 12 years after his first consulship: a discrep- 
ancy of 14 or 15 years. The conqueror brought with him the acknowl- 
edged empire of the world. He was therefore fully prepared to as 
sume that divine elevation for which every preparation had been 
made during his absence from the capital. 

According to the chronology arranged for the occasion, it was just 
seven cycles, each of no years, from the apotheosis of Romulus, by 
whose sacred name of Janus Quirinus, Augustus desired himself to be 
called. The pretension was that Augustus was the reincarnation of 
Janus Quirinus, or Romulus; therefore, the temples erected to his 
worship in the west were commonly dedicated to Augustus and Roma ; 
the images of the latter being merely those of a beautiful matron. 
With the street effigies of Augustus, of which Ovid informs us there 
were a thousand in Rome alone, the members of Augustus' family, 
the Holy Family, as Ovid calls it, namely, his wife, Livia, and one of 
his adopted sons, Drusus — both of whom were canonized — were 
sometimes associated. Many of these effigies continued in use for 
centuries, and some of them are possibly doing service yet. From 
the year of the apotheosis, that is to say, A. U. 738, began a new 
sera. It was in this year, says Lenormant, that Augustus assumed 
those rights of coinage which ever afterwards remained the preroga- 
tive of the sovereign-pontiff. " The new year day of this aera was 
originally February 26. This was eventually altered to December 25. 

5' It was in A. U. 738 that Augustus assumed those rights of coinage which ever 
afterwards remained the prerogative of the sovereign-pontiff. Lenormant, li, 214. 



THE WORSHIP OF CAESAR. 45 

Except in the Iberian peninsular, where the custom of employing 
the Julian ^ra prevailed down to a recent period, the Augustan aera, 
since masked under other names, served for the dates of the Roman 
world, until some time after the reign of Justinian II., when, without 
any unnecessary disturbance of recorded dates, the years, which were 
formerly reckoned from A. U. 738, were reckoned from A. U. 753. " 
When the chronology of the Augustan period is closely examined it 
wili be found to have been altered by the Latin Sacred College to the 
extent of 15 years. Proofs of this alteration of the calendar appear 
upon examining the Timsean and Ciceronian aera of Romulus; the 
dates of the Ludi S^culares given by Censorinus; the erroneous aeras 
ascribed by modern chronologists to Augustus' principal Triumph; 
the conflicting dates ascribed to the consulates of Augustus by Sue- 
tonius and Eutropius, or inscribed on the monuments at Ancyra and 
elsewhere; the dated coins of Rome audits provinces; besides other 
circumstances, which it would be tedious to rehearse in this place. 

To prepare for the Apotheosis of A. U. 738, the Augustan histo- 
rians and poets — bearing in mind the slaughter of Perugia; the un- 
grateful murders of Cicero and Lucius Antony; the tragic death of 
Marc Antony and Cleopatra; the mysterious banishment of Ovid; the 
condemnation of Afidius Memla, and many other similar circum- 
stances — now tuned and struck anew their mendacious lyres. Let us 
listen to some of their strains, first disposing of the too premature 
pgeans of Virgil, which he sang in his Fourth Eclogue: 

"The last Great yEra foretold by the Cumaean Sibyl is now ar- 
rived; the Cycles begin anew. Now returns the Golden Age of 
Saturn, now appears the Immaculate Virgin. (This was Maia, the 
virgin mother of Augustus). Now descends from Heaven a divine 
Nativity. O! chaste Lucina, (this was the goddess of maternity), 
speed the Mother's pains, haste the glorious Birth, and usher in the 
reign of thy Apollo. In thy consulship, O! Pollio, shall happen this 
glorious Advent, and the great months shall then begin to roll. 
Thenceforth whatever vestige of Original Sin remains, shall be swept 
away from earth forever, and the Sea of God shall be the Prince of 
Peace!" 

As before intimated, this strain was sung too prematurely, and the 
battle of Actium had yet to be fought and won before the Messianic 
and Apotheosis project could be realised. Meanwhile no glorious 
Advent is recorded, no great months began to roll, no Great ^ra 
was commenced, no Cycles were renewed, the peace was postponed, 

*^ See Appendix on " Chronology of Augustus." 



46 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

the temple of Janus was reopened, and Original Sin has retained its 
place in the liturgy of the Roman church to the present day. 

The Pollio alluded to in this Eclogue was Caius Asinius Pollio, 
born A. U. 678, died A. U. 757, an orator, poet, historian, politician, 
warrior, governor of Gaul, courtier and time-server. He was with 
Julius Caesar when he passed the Rubicon and again at Pharsalia. 
Pollio was named as consul with Cn. Domitius Calvinus, for the year 
713, but, although the year goes by their names, such was the con- 
fusion of the times that neither of them actually filled the consular 
chair. After the death of Caesar, Pollio took sides with Marc Antony, 
but, either from the desperate circumstances of the latter or because 
he was bribed with the consulship, Pollio, before the slaughter of 
Perugia, went over to Augustus. It was he, who, introducing Virgil 
to Maecenas, procured for the poet the restitution and enlargement 
of his landed estates and earned for himself the immortality conferred 
by the mention of his name in the Eclogues. His own works, of 
which there were several, have all disappeared. The capitulation of 
Perugia, the holocaust of human victims sacrificed upon the altar of 
Julius the Father, the Treaty of Brundusium, and the departure of 
Antony for the east, all occurred during the nominal consulship of 
Pollio, and they marked both the advent of Augustus Caesar and the 
assumed restoration of peace to the Roman world. " 

We now begin with the literature of the triumph, deification and 
Apotheosis, which followed Augustus' return from Asia. In pursu- 
ance of the astrology which Rome had gathered from Etruria, Greece, 
Pontus, Galilee, Syria, Egypt, Spain and Gaul, indeed from every 
source whence came the heterogeneous materials which now com- 
posed her military forces and her millions of slaves, it was necessary 
to show that the Incarnation was connected with previous incarna- 
tions; that it occurred at the beginning of a new divine cycle; that 
it was the issue of a divine father and mortal mother; that the mother 
was a wife-virgin; that the birth happened at the end of ten solar 
months; that it occurred in an obscure place; that it was foretold by 
prophecy or sacred oracle; that it was presaged or accompanied by 
prodigies of Nature; that the divinity of the child was recognized by 
sages; that the Holy One exhibited extraordinary signs of precocity 
and wisdom; that his destruction was sought by the ruling powers, 
whose precautions were of course defeated; that he worked miracles; 
that he exhibited a profound humility; that his apotheosis would 

^* Appian, de Bell. Civ.; Dio. Cass.; Livy, Ep., 126; Suet., in Aug. 



THE WORSHIP OF CESAR. 47 

bring peace on earth, and that he would finally ascend to heaven, 
there to join the Father. Accordingly, the Augustan writers furnished 
all these materials. 

The first day of the Apotheosis, February 26, was that of the Nebo- 
Nazarene nativity; whilst the year was that of the Ludi Sseculares, 
dating from the Apotheosis of Romulus, Suetonius tells us concern- 
ing the Nativity that Atia or Maia having, in the absence of her hus- 
band, gone to the temple of Apollo at midnight, there fell asleep; 
and in that condition was approached by a serpent. Upon awaken- 
ing, she seemed, for reasons stated by the chronicler, to be aware 
of what had happened. In the tenth month she was delivered of 
Augustus, who became known as the Son of the god Apollo. The 
birth occurred in Velitre, a village some twenty miles from Rome, 
and in a small and humble cottage, which ever afterwards was held 
Sacred. Even the owner of the house, having incautiously approached 
it, was blasted by lightning from heaven. The birth of Augustus was 
foretold not only by the Cumasan Sibyl, it was predicted by a divine 
oracle delivered in Velitre and by a prodigy that had happened pub- 
licly in Rome five or six months before the Nativity and was the oc- 
casion of the intended Slaughter of Innocents presently to be men- 
tioned. Before the Nativity, Maia dreamt that her body was scattered 
to the stars and encompassed the universe. After the Nativity, Oc- 
tavianus, her earthly husband, dreamt he saw the bright beams of 
the Sun emanate from her person; and when he sacrificed, where 
Alexander the Great had formerly sacrificed and had seen a miracle, 
namely, at a temple of Dionysius or Bacchus in Thrace, Octavianus 
saw a similar miracle: a sheet of flame ascended from the altar, en- 
veloped the steeple and mounted high to heaven. On the following 
night Octavianus dreamt he saw the Infant Augustus grasping the 
Thunderbolt and wearing the Sceptre and Robe of Jupiter, his head 
surrounded by a radiance of glory, and his chariot decked wi.h laurel, 
while yoked to it were six steeds of purest white. When, before the 
Nativity, the divine oracle at Velitre predicted that "Nature was 
about to bring forth a Prince over the Roman people," the Senate 
passed an Act, A. U. 692, ordering that "No male child born that 
year should be reared or brought up." Thus, every boy born within 
the Roman pale was devoted to destruction, and a frightful Slaughter 
of Innocents would have ensued, had not those who expected chil- 
dren, removed the tablets of the law from the walls of the serarium; 
and thus defeated the atrocious edict. When the sage and astrologer, 
P, Nigidius, learnt that Atia had been delivered of Augustus, he 



48 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

openly proclaimed that the Lord of the Universe was born. While 
Augustus was yet an infant, he arose from his cradle at night and 
next morning he was found upon the roof of the house, facing Apollo, 
or the rising Sun. On the city side of the house a multitude of frogs 
maintained a deafening clamour. So soon as Augustus was old 
enough to speak, he commanded these animals to keep silence, and 
from that moment they were completely hushed. 

When, at a later period, Augustus went with M. Vipsanius Agrippa 
to the study of Theogenes, the astrologer, at Apollonia, and there 
divulged the hour of his nativity, Theogenes fell down and worship- 
ped him as God, (adoravitque eum). ^* At a later period he was 
worshipped by Lepidus, the Pontifex Maximus of Rome. " Among 
the miracles that Augustus wrought, his merest touch was sufficient 
to cure deformity or disease; and so universally was his divine origin 
and attributes acknowledged that many people, in dying, left their 
entire fortunes to the Sacred fisc, in gratitude, as they themselves 
expressed it, for having been permitted to live during the incarnation 
and earthly sojourn of this Son of God. Suetonius (Aug. 100) in- 
forms us that in the course of twenty years private individuals be- 
queathed to Augustus no less than 35 million aurei, equal to about 40 
million sovereigns or half-eagles of the present weight and standard. 
In addition to these legacies, numerous vassal princes left their en- 
tire patrimonies to this Messiah. 

To evince his humility, once a year, Augustus, veiled in the sacred 
peplum, stood at the porch of the Regia and received alms from the 
pious. His Apotheosis not only brought profound peace to the Ro- 
man world, so that the temple of Janus was permanently closed, it 
marked a new ^ra. At his death, concludes Suetonius, " there v/as 
not wanting a person of praetorian rank who saw his spirit ascend to 
Heaven." The name of this privileged witness was the senator 
Numericus Atticus. The Ascension of Augustus is engraved upon 
the great cameo, from the spoils of Constantinople, presented by 
Baldwin II., to Louis IX., and now in the Cabinet of France. A fac- 
simile of it is published in Duruy's " History of Rome." 

Having thus briefly sketched the history of the Augustan worship, 
it is next in order to call those contemporary witnesses who attested 
this worship, or who sang its praises. We have already heard Ovid, 
Virgil and Suetonius. We v/ill now turn to a later work of Virgil; 
and also to Horace, Manilius, Tacitus and others. 

** Snet., in Aug. The Roman term for astrologer was " mathematician." 
" Manning's Xiphilinus, i, 114. 



THE WORSHIP OF C^SAR. 49 

Says Virgil (^neid VI, 789-93): 

This is Cresar and the Holy Family 

Spanning the spacious axle of heaven, 

This is He, whom thou hast oft heard prc<mised thee, 

Augustus Caesar, Son of God, who 

Shall restore the Golden Age to Latium. 

Says Horace (Book I) : 

" Come we entreat thee. Divine Apollo, thy brilliant shoulders robed in clouds . . . 
Kind Maia's winged Child, if with change of shape thou dost take on earth the form 
oi a. Youth, deigning to be styled the Avenger of Caesar, late mayest thou return to 
Heaven." 

Again: 

" Father and Guardian of the human race, mayest thou (great Jove) reign with Au- 
gustus, thy second in power . . . Inferior only to thee, He shall rule with equity the 
wide world." 

And as if not satisfied with these expressions, Horace elsewhere 
adds that of " Pr^esens divus habebitur Augustus " : We have with 
us, the living god Augustus. 

Listen to Manilius, (Astronomica, I, 7-10:) 

"It is thee, Augustus, thyself a god, and the Prince and Father of his Country, 
who by divine law reigneth over the universe, and who awaiteth his place in heaven 
with the Father, who inspires me to sing these sublime themes." 

Again, (I, 773-5 

" The Julian family sprung from Venus and descended from the skies, returns again 
to heaven, where reigns Augustus with Jupiter the Father." ^* 

Were it necessary, these testimonies could be greatly multipled ; 
but they would fatigue the reader. The temples at Ancyra and 
Ephesus, besides myriads of coins and inscriptions, still extant, hail 
Augustus as Divus Filius, or the Son of God; the medal published by 
Father Hardouin in his work on Ancient Coins, pourtrays the pontifi- 
cal hat of Augustus surmounted by a Latin cross; whilst Horace and 
some of the inscriptions allude to the god as the Son of Maia, who, 
as we know, was universally recognized as the Mother of God. " 

Coveting deification, Augustus neither commanded himself to be 
deified, nor to be worshipped ; but with the prudence and deviousness 
that characterized all his measures, he munificently rewarded those 

^^ It did not appear to present any difficulties to the Roman mind that the Augustus 
should have been successively regarded as the Son of Julius the Father, Apollo the 
Father and the coadjutor of Jupiter the Father. Historical incarnations are far more 
intractable than mythical ones, and demand a much larger degree of credulity on the 
part of the worshipper. 

*' At Lyons a temple was erected to Mercuric Augustoet Maia; Augustas. Duruy'f 
Hist. Rome. 



50 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

who set the example of addressing and worshipping him as the Su- 
preme Being; whilst he heavily and cruelly punished those who ne- 
glected this impious homage. Arminius complained to his soldiers 
that the Romans had made Augustus a god. This was not strictly cor- 
rect: Augustus had made himself a god; as Scipio and Sylla had at- 
tempted to do, and as Titus Flamininus, Sertorius and Julius Caesar 
had actually done, before him. 

By securing and uniting in his own person the tribunitian, consular, 
censorial and sacerdotal functions; by suppressing the quaestors; and 
by taking the appointment of the prgetors into his own hands, Au- 
gustus stealthily and noiselessly secured all those powers of the state 
which Julius had grasped with ruder hands, but had suddenly lost at 
the foot of Pompey's statue. These usurpations having been confirmed 
by a trembling senate, Augustus was raised almost in fact, as well as 
in name, to that deified rank which Julius had established, but so 
briefly enjoyed. 

With the consular power Augustus acquired lawful command over 
the army, navy and militia, lawful control over the provinces and the 
right to deal with tributary or vassal kingdoms; with the censor- 
ial power and the suppression of the quaestors he obtained control 
of the tithes and other revenues, the administration of the treasury, 
the construction and repair of public works and the right to enquire 
into the private affairs of citizens, both by confession and otherwise; 
the last a most potent instrument of tyranny. With the acquisition 
of the tribunitian power his person became Sacred and his decrees 
Inviolable and Infallible. Tremendous as were these powers, they 
were increased by the law of sacred treason, or Laesa Majestas, which 
made it a capital crime even to speak, of him irreverently. He also 
acquired the lawful right to arbitrarily convene or dismiss the senate. 
Through the appointment of prstors he exercised a powerful influ- 
ence upon the magistracy and the administration of justice. Finally, 
with the office of supreme-pontiff he acquired lawful authority over 
the priesthood, the fiamens, augurs, bishops, curates, vestal virgins, 
temples, sanctuaries, shrines and monasteries, over the calendar, over 
the coinage, over the fisc and over all sacerdotal institutes, preroga- 
tives, rites, ceremonies, festivals, holidays, dedications and canoni- 
zations; as well as over marriages, divorces, adoptions, testaments, 
and benefices, or church livings; in short, he became the Supreme 
Lord over all that immense class of subjects embraced by the Roman 
imperial, censorial, fiscal and ecclesiastical systems. 

After he had acquired these powers he appointed a new set of of- 



THE WORSHIP OF C^SAR. 51 

ficers, of his own creation and dependent upon himself, to whom he 
assigned their execution or enjoyment. In carrying out these meas- 
ures, Augustus was evidently guided by legal advice. Force was 
seldom manifested; injustice was not openly displayed; and the rights 
of property, office, title, privilege, or custom, were rarely violated 
without a plausible pretext. The forms of law, which had grown up 
under the republican constitution, were employed to destroy the last 
vestiges of liberty; and the empire was enchained, subdued and 
crushed as completely as though its master was indeed endowed with 
the supernatural powers attributed to him by his sycophants and 
devotees. 

The college of Augusine priests was elevated to the same rank as 
the four other great religious colleges; the function of the first-named 
one being to establish rites, offer prayers, chaunt hymns and accept 
sacrifices, in the temples sacred to Augustus. The worship of Augus- 
tus, Son of God, was officially incorporated into the religion of the 
empire; every city of the empire had an augustal fiamen, every house 
an augustal shrine; succeeding emperors themselves sacrificed to Au- 
gustus, and irreverence to this deity was visited with the severest 
penalties. Afidius Memla, for refusing to take his oath of office in the 
name of the divine Augustus, was ejected from the senate, and the 
ancient city of Czyicus, for neglecting the worship of Augustus, the 
Son of God, was deprived of its privileges. During the reign of Ti- 
berius the head was removed from an image of Augustus and placed 
upon another image, possibly of the same god. This offense was re- 
garded with such profound horror that it was brought to the attention 
of the senate, who ordered several persons, suspected of knowing its 
author, to be put to the torture until they confessed his name. When 
this was discovered the offender was summarily executed. For chang- 
ing one's clothes in the presence of an image of Augustus the penalty 
was death. For whipping a slave near the shrine of Augustus the pun- 
ishment was death. For defacing a coin which bore the effigy of Au- 
gustus the penalty was death, not because it was a coin, but because 
it bore the image of thG god. This is proved by the next instance. 
For defacing the effigy of Augustus on a ring the penalty was death. 
For accepting honours in a colony on the same day that somewhat 
similar honours had been decreed to Augustus the penalty was death. 
It has been insinuated that the worship of Augustus was an idle form, 
an empty, meaningless ceremony, a mode of flattery, like that alleged 
to be still rendered to some eastern potentates. To complete this as- 
surance it will be necessary to prove that the thumbscrew, the rack, 



52 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

the headsman's block, the axe, and the bloody remains of Roman 
citizens stuck upon lances at the city gates, the remains of men who 
had been executed for sacrilege to the god Augustus, were also illu- 
sions; that Suetonius, Tacitus, Josephus, Pliny and the other post- 
Augustan writers on this subject have transmitted to us a mass of 
falsehoods without the extenuating motive of either religion, interest, 
or ambition; that the myriads of Roman coins, found in the most 
distant places, stamped with the rayed image of Augustus and pro- 
claiming him in explicit words the Theos, or living god, the Sebastos, 
or Holy One, or else the Son of God, are forgeries ; and that the tem- 
ples erected in his honour and in which worship and sacrifices to him 
were conducted by a hired priesthood and enforced upon the people, 
were so many figments of the imagination. " 

Costly temples, altars and images were erected to Augustus in 
Rome, Nola, Pompeii, Athens, Piscennus, Proconnesus, Tomis, By- 
zantium, Cyzicus, Antioch, Ancyra, Samaria, Jerusalem, Alexandria, 
Lyons and Vienne, (in Gaul,) Leon and Terracona, (in Spain,) and 
numerous other cities, the remains, in some cases almost complete 
remains, of which are still extant; the worship of Augustus was regu- 
larly conducted in all these places; and all classes of men were com- 
pelled to bow to his images and to worship them, upon the penalty of 
death. ^' In Italy no such compulsion was necessary. Indeed, this 
worship stood in such high estimation that petty images of Augustus 
were used as charms, which were suspended or worn upon the person; 
and the larger images of his incarnation, which were erected in high- 
ways and public places, were, inthe absence of a temple, resorted to 
for sanctuary and respected as such. 

On the numerous votive tablets and other monuments erected to 
the worship of Augustus he is variously addressed asLiber Pater Au- 
gustus, with the thyrsus of Bacchus (3046), Jupiter Optimus Maxi- 
musAugustus (6423), Apollo Augustus (534), Serapis Augustus (4044), 
Saturnus Augustus (1796), Savus Augustus (3896), Savus Adsalluta 
(5134), Sedatus Augustus (3922), Salus Augustus (4162), Mercurius 
Augustus (1434), ^sus, Baldir, etc., the numbers being those of the 

^* The coins with the rayed images and sacred titles of Augustus are depicted and 
described in Cohen's " Monnaies Imperiales," i, 107, etc. They are also mentioned 
in Lenormant, li, 170, and in many other numismatic works. 

^' Soranus, a Latin poet, in the reign of Julius Csesar, was put to death upon the 
charge of betraying a secret. He acknowled no god but the Soul of the Universe, 
Lempriere, in " Valerius." It is therefore likely that his real offence was the refusal 
to worship the sovereign-pontiff. 



THE WORSHIP OF C^SAR. 53 

inscriptions in Mommsen's "Corpus Inscriptionura Latinorum." 
Lanciani informs us that of the vast number of structures on the 
Palatine Hill which comprised the palaces of the Caesars " but one 
section alone remained unaltered throughout all the ages. """ This 
was the section built by Augustus; the one in which he dwelt. It 
was destroyed in 1549. To this maybe added the fact that of all 
the memorials of the distant past which the Vatican preserves with 
the most jealous care is the marble image of Divus Augustus. Like 
reverence, however, has not been extended by the Italian govern- 
ment to his sepulchre, which, it is stated, has recently been subjected 
to indignity. " 

The church of Augustus tolerated no rivalry and permitted no here- 
sies. Agrippa, whose great services to the state might have evoked a 
popularity inconvenient to the Augustus, died suddenly at the age of 
51 years. After the death of Augustus, and by order of Livia, the 
innocent sons of Agrippa were put to death. ""^ In the reign of Tiber- 
ius, Caius Silanus, proconsul of Asia, being accused of irreverence to 
the god Augustus, was excommunicated and banished to Cythera. *' 
The Egyptians and Jews in the city of Rome were ordered to re- 
nounce their impious worship or leave Italy at short notice. Four 
thousand of them were transported. ^* Junius, who pretended to be 
able to raise the dead, was forbidden to practice his art. The Chal- 
dean astrologers, and afterwards all astrologers, magi, and worship- 
pers of strange gods, were banished out of Italy. "* 

After the death of the Augustus, which occurred, according to the 
received chronology, in A. D. 14, the army of office-holders, priests, 
sycophants and panders, who filled the capital, hastened to transfer 
their scandalous homage to Tiberius, his successor. For this they were 
at once rebuked by Tiberius, who reminded them that he was no god, 
but like themselves a mere human being; and he forbade them to ad- 
dress him by any sacred title, or even to swear by his name. Yet such 
an impetus had this worship received that his edict was evaded, and 
the courtiers swore by the emperor's Genius. It was perhaps to avoid 
a homage which he was powerless to prevent that Tiberius removed 
to Capri, where he resided until he died. In Rome he sternly en- 

^^ Lanciani's "Ancient Rome," p. 109. 
*' London Weekly Graphic, Nov. 14, 1874. 

^^ In like manner Tiberius permitted his favorite, Sejanus, to erect images of him- 
self in Rome: then he destroyed him. 

*3 Tacitus, Ann., in, 68. «* Tacitus Ann., 11, 86. 

" Tacitus, Ann., Ii, 28-32. 



54 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

forced the worship of Augustus, although in the provinces he added 
or permitted that of himself. He must have reduced the number, or 
else the emoluments, which Augustus had awarded to the Roman 
ecclesiastics, *^ for, without any other assignable cause of offense, the 
works written after his death, most of which were the product of 
their busy pens, sought to blacken his memory with hints of crimes 
\ hich it was impossible for a man of his venerable age to commit. 

After the death of Tiberius the superstition of Rome attached 
itself to Caligula, and made him a god. Philo of Alexandria affords 
us a glimpse of this impious worship in his account of an embassy 
which he headed on behalf of the Jews. The Alexandrians sent a 
counter embassy to thwart him, and they met in the imperial pres- 
ence under the following circumstances: 

" Caius (Caligula) was engaged at this time in transforming the 
garden of the Lamias into a royal residence; and the rival embassies 
were summoned thither. They found him hurrying from room to 
room, surrounded by architects and workmen, to whom he was giving 
directions; and they were compelled to follow in his train. Stopping 
to address the Jews he asked : ' Are you the god-haters who deny my 
divinity, which all the rest of the world acknowledges? * The Alex- 
andrian envoys hastened to put in their word: 'Lord, these Jews 
alone have refused to sacrifice to your welfare.' Said the Jews: 
'Nay, oh Lord, this is a slander. We sacrificed for you not once, 
but thrice; first, when you assumed the empire; then, when you re- 
covered from your illness; and again, for your success against the 
Germans.' 'Yes,' observed Caligula, 'You sacrificed /i^r me ; but 
not to me, 'and thereupon he hurried to another room, the Jews 
trembling and their rivals jeering, as in a play." A similar avoidance 
of this worship at Jerusalem is mentioned by Josephus; and when 
the procurator of Judea attempted to set up a statue of Caligula in 
the Temple, the dagger of some Judean Brutus alone prevented the 
profanation. 

After Caligula came Claudius. He also demanded to be worship- 
ped as a god. Josephus has preserved the text of an edict in which 
Claudius admits that the Jews had been unjustly treated by Caligula, 
because they had refused to worship him as god, contrary to the 
charters of privileges which they claimed to have obtained from Ju- 
lius and Augustus; and Claudius orders these charters to be respect- 
ed. " This edict was no doubt procured through bribery of the 
court officials; for Claudius soon forgot all about it and demanded 

*^ Suet., Aug-., 30. *■' Josephus, Ant., xix. v, 2. 



THE WORSHIP OF CiESAR. 55 

from the Jews similar worship to himself. Rather than submit to it, 
the Jewish people came before Petronius en masse and told him he 
might slay them all, for they would never yield to such a demand; 
whereupon he v/rotc to Claudius that if he insisted upon being wor- 
shipped in Judea, he would soon reign over a desert. Before Pe- 
tronius received the reply of Claudius, the dagger had also dispatched 
the latter; but not before his insistence upon being worshipped in 
Britain had sacrificed the heroic Boadicea and the entire nation of the 
lesini; who were as resolute as the Jews on this subject. The levity 
of Nero and the short reigns of Galba, Otho and Vitellius, diverted 
the worship of the reigning sovereigns to the dead and canonized 
Augustus, Son of God. But it appeared again in the reigns of Ves- 
pasian and Titus, who were also worshipped as incarnations of the 
deity. In the reigns of Domitian and Nerva, both of whom assumed 
to be the Creator and demanded and received divine homage, this 
blasphemous and happily always declining worship received a fur- 
ther check; so that when Trajan ascended the throne, Tacitus 
was enabled to write the passage already quoted concerning the reign 
of Augustus: " The reverence due to the gods was no longer exclu- 
sive. Augustus claimed equal worship. Temples were built and 
statues were erected to him; a mortal man was adored; and priests 
and pontiffs were appointed to pay him impious homage." 

Following Trajan were Hadrian, Antoninus, Marcus Aurelius, 
Commodus, Pertinax and Aurelian, all of whom demanded and ac- 
cepted divine homage. But this was almost the last of it. The 
repugnance and resistance, which had begun in the provinces, after- 
wards manifested itself in the intellectual centres of the empire; and 
though it was attempted again and again to return to the worship of 
Augustus, the attempt failed; so that in the place of an odious and 
degrading religion, Elagabalus deemed it feasible to revive the an- 
cient worship of the Sun. The theogonies of Hesiod and Homer, '* 
of Virgil and Ovid, were obsolete; the Julian and Augustan worship 
had become obsolete ; and the worship of living emperors v/as repug- 
nant to the spirit of the West. Although this was the period of those 
numerous Mithraic monuments which now appear in the archaeolog- 
ical museums of Rome, Paris, London, York and Newcastle, the 
religion of the Sun made but little headway. The legions ac- 
cepted it, but that was all. Mithraism, too, was obsolete. Its vital 
force was long since spent. Elagabalus was supported by some of 
the best families of Rome, but the weakness of his cause and the 

*® Cicero de Div., 17, 38, 67, 126, 248, 262, especially 126. 



56 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

opposition and hatred of the Augustan priesthood, whose livings it 
endangered, thwarted his object ; and have since loaded his name with 
obloquy. His plan of directing into a purer channel the superstition 
and religious fervour of his countrymen, though delayed for three- 
fourths of a century by the Roman ecclesiastics, was nevertheless 
carried out more successfully by Diocletian, who revived the Sun- 
worship which Elagabalus had established. But the revival was only 
accomplished at the cost of dividing the empire into four satrapies; 
and with this division, what remained of the worship of Augustus fell, 
to rise no more. In its place and in the place of the ephemeral 
Mithraism and of the Dionysian worship, which, according to the coins 
of the period, succeeded it for a brief interval, arose that later re- 
ligion of the West, which conserved the fruits of military conquests, 
that, without it, might have been made in vain and that absorbed all 
the other religions which these conquests had brought together. 

Emperor- worship is not so much the product of the Orient as it is 
of those vast hierarchies which could only arise in the Orient, so long 
as the Occident remained comparatively destitute of population. The 
agglomeration of an extensive empire, embracing numerous races and 
tribes of men, differing from each other in origin, aptitudes, mythol- 
ogy and religion — especially when such an agglomeration is followed 
by the practice of transplantation and fusion, the whole empire being 
governed by a single hierarch — has always been followed by emperor- 
worship. 

The empires of India, Persia, Assyria, Egypt, Macedon and Rome, 
were all of this character; they all practiced the transplantation and 
fusion of the people whom they conquered; they were all governed 
by hierarchs; and these hierarchs were always worshipped by their 
subjects. Some traces of the Oriental tendency to worship human 
gods is observable even in modern times. To-day, in Madras, the 
the statue of the British queen-empress is annointed with consecrated 
oil, strewn with flowers, propitiated with offerings of frankincense, 
and worshipped on bended knees by the natives; who call it the great 
Maharanee, or Queen of Queens, the Holy One, the Supreme God. 
That these are acts of piety and not of flattery, is evident from the 
fact that they are done furtively and in defiance of the police; who 
are instructed to prevent them. 

If on the one hand, extensive empire and hierarchical government 
furnished the ground of emperor-worship, on the other hand, the my- 
thology of the Orient supplied the seed. The incarnations of Bel- 
Issus, Nin-Ies, Tiglath-pil-Esar, Cyrus, Darius, Rhamses, Alexander 



THE WORSHIP OF CAESAR. 57 

the Great, the Ptolemies, the Selucidse, and the other personages al- 
luded to herein, formed a series of Asiatic gods as well marked as 
any generation of monsters traced by the philosophic eye of Darwin. 
Even this line of gods, which, with perhaps one or two doubtful ex- 
ceptions, consisted of actual historical personages, was complemented 
by another series of wholly mythological beings. Such were the in- 
carnations of Vishnu, les Chrishna, and the Brahminical Buddha of 
the Hindus; Assur, of Assyria; Nebo-Nazaru, of Babylon; Osiris and 
Horus, of Egypt; Ormudz, of Persia; and Ischenou, Chres, Jasius 
and Bacchus, of Greece. 

Water will not rise above its own level. Man will not worship a 
god who is either above or below the poise of his own comprehen- 
sion. The gods have therefore this useful function: they furnish an 
infallible barometer of the human intellect. Measured by this scale, 
the worship of Augustus was not at the period of his advent below 
the comprehension of the West, for, with the exception of the stub-, 
born Northmen, we hear of no dissatisfaction with it. Rural Italy, 
Gaul, Spain, Pannonia and Southern Germany, all accepted or en- 
dured it; Britain, Saxony and Scandinavia alone rejected it. Nor 
was it below the comprehension of Egypt and Asia Minor, for only 
in Judeado any serious revolts against it appear in the chronicles of 
the times. But if, with the heroic exceptions mentioned, the rural 
populations endured it without repugnance, the great cities of the 
empire, such as Antioch, Alexandria, Athens and Rome, found it too 
degrading for continued acceptance. It was these centres of intel- 
lectual activity that gave effect to the revolts which emperor-worship 
had provoked in Britain, Frisia, Saxony and Judea; and it was out of 
this combination of popular resistance and intellectual disgust that 
arose a long and deadly struggle against the worship of Augustus and 
the wide-spread and firmly-rooted superstitions upon which it was 
founded; a struggle which finally ended in the adoption of Chris- 
tianity. " 

*' The coins of Augustus commonly have the rayed image of that personage, with 
the legend DIVVS AVGVSTVS; or AVGVSTVS DIVVS FILIVS. This style was 
afterwards followed on the coins stamped with the efifigy of Christ, the first one of 
which was issued by Justinian II., Rhinotmetus, about the year A. D. 705, with the 
legend d. N. IhS. CPS REX REGNANTIVM. There were several issues of these 
coins and some slight variations in the spelling. The small " h " is really a Greek " e," 
while the capital " P " is really a Greek " R." Sabatier's Byzantine Coins, Justinian 
II., No. 2. For Divos and Divus on Coins of Julius and Augustus, see Humphreys" 
"Coin Collector's Manual," plate 8. 



> 



58 



CHAPTER IV. 

DEFECTIVE THEORIES OF THE FEUDAL SYSTEM. 

Disagreeiaent of eminent historians regarding the character and sera of the feudal 
system — Viewed by some as a condition of society — By others as a system of caste — 
By others as a species of land tenure — Opinions of Hallam — Robertson — Guizot — 
Buckle — and Stubbs. 

THE extraordinary diversity of opinion which still prevails, with 
regard to the nature, the limits, and even the aera, of the 
Feudal System in Europe, suggests the difficulties which have at- 
tended the elucidation of this abstruse subject. By some historians 
the feudal system has been regarded as the general condition of so- 
ciety during the medieval ages, by others as a system of social 
ranks or caste ', and others as the law or custom governing lands held 
on condition of military service. Budseus, Zazius and De Coulanges 
trace the system to the institutes of pagan Rome, Guizot bases it 
upon the Christian ecclesiastical benefices of the fifth century, Rob- 
ertson first discerns it in the seventh, Hallam in the tenth, Draper 
postpones its establishment until the eleventh century, and Gibbon 
shirks the enquiry altogether. All of these eminent authors unite in 
the admission of a feudal system, and some of them treat it at great 
length, but no two agree as to what it was, nor when, nor where, nor 
under what circumstances, it was adopted. In short, the feudal 
system is an apparition, which everybody has seen, but nobody has 
cared to follow beyond the mysterious portals whence it emerged 
and into which, as we shall prove, it afterwards happily faded. 

Those who have regarded the feudal system merely as a form of 
society or as a system of caste, have never proceeded with their ex- 
planations far enough to enable the feudal form of society or the 

' Caste is from casta, a Portuguese word signifying colour. It was applied by the 
early Portuguese commanders to the system of social ranks which they found in In- 
dia. The Hindu word is varna, with precisely the same meaning. Hence it is 
probable that originally the Brahmins were the whitest of all the Indians. However 
this may be, caste no longer proceeds from colour, and throughout the present work 
it will be used to designate the various orders or ranks of society. 



DEFECTIVE THEORIES OF THE FEUDAL SYSTEM. 59 

feudal arrangement of caste to be distinguished from others, nor to 
furnish a guide to the origin of such institutes, nor the reasons for 
their adoption. These are defects which render such definitions 
practically valueless. Some writers have, indeed, attributed the 
medieval system of caste to the relative importance of Franks and 
Romans, as measured by the retts or were-gild of the Salic law; but 
the explanation is insufficient, for this were-gild only accounts for 
the difference between a ''common Frank " and a " Roman possessor 
of lands," and between "landowners" and " culti'vators. " These 
differences may have betokened no distinction at all in caste, or, as- 
suming that they did, the distinction may not have been universal. 
Even if universal, this were-gild only vaguely establishes two or three 
grades of social rank, of whose legal rights or obligations to the state, 
or to one another, we are left substantially in the dark, and are 
therefore not warranted in basing upon them any supposed system 
of caste. 

The common description of feudalism, that one which has been 
adopted by the legal profession, is a system of tenures by military or 
other services, chiefly military. This explanation is even less satis- 
isfactory than the previous ones. It is like describing man as an 
animal that wears clothes. True, that man wears clothes, true, also, 
that man is the only animal that does wear clothes. Yet, was he not 
man, before he wore clothes, and has he, even now, no other nor 
more important function than that of wearing clothes? As an expe- 
dient for economising thought, by limiting the enquiry to the Car- 
lovingian aera and to a single accidental mark, which leads to the dis- 
covery of no essential characteristic of feudalism, the theory of 
military tenures is a happy one. As a means of ascertaining com- 
prehensively the nature of the feudal system, as an instrument for 
determining the characteristic features of a feud, as a mark to denote 
the beginning or end of feudal government, or feudal tenures, it is 
of no use whatever. In those causes, now of the rarest occurrence, 
which turn upon the essentials of a feud, the Bench may hereafter 
find it necessary to assume a totally different basis, for the origin of 
feudal obligations and customs, than military or other services. 

For we trust to be able to show that the feudal system was con- 
nected and necessarily connected with the church; that it was a de- 
velopment of the Sacred constitution of the Roman empire and 
legally expired with it; that it began with that constitution and its 
requirements; that it existed long before the establishment of the 
military tenures referred to ; that there were many other feudal in- 



6o THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED, 

stitutions and customs, such as the feudalisation of church revenues, 
which had no connection with mihtary services; and that feudal es- 
tates of land were not founded upon military services, but upon the 
inalienability of lands belonging to the church, the use of which was 
granted as a favour — bcneficio — by the church for produce or for ser- 
vices, which, whether civil or military, was of no essential importance. 

Many of these circumstances and relations were observed by the 
very writers who were constrained to shunt the whole subject into the 
petty cul de sac of military tenures. That they made so little of them 
can only be ascribed to the inadequate importance which they ac- 
corded to the Sacred constitution, or else to the vice of verbalism 
and the misleading etymology of feoh. This is a Gothic word mean- 
ing a cow, and, by metonym, a payment, reward, or fee. It is hardly 
too much to say that, hitherto, this word has successfully resisted 
every attempt made to discover either the origin, the eera, or the na- 
ture of the feudal system in Europe. 

Respect for those who have treated this difficult subject, render it 
proper that their opinions shall be consulted and briefly discussed at 
the outset. The ablest of these writers, at least in the estimation of 
English readers, was Mr. Hallam, and we shall begin with the argu- 
ments set forth in his deservedly popular "View of the state of Eu- 
rope during the Middle Ages." 

I. Mr. Hallam does not define the feudal system, nor does he men- 
tion any characteristics by which it may be always distinguished 
(/. e., at any and all stages of its development) from a system of 
government which is not feudal. His treatise begins with a descrip- 
tion of "benefices, or in other words, fiefs." Avoiding all mention 
of inalienable property and the origin of benefices, he skips over 
several centuries of time and conducts the reader at once to the ma- 
turity of feudalism, which he describes as a system of land tenures, 
that obliged the tenant to "serve his sovereign in the field." Thus, 
"to render military service became the essential obligation which 
the tenant of a benefice undertook, and out of these «««>«/ grants 
there grew up in the tenth century, both in name and in reality, the 
system of feudal tenures." If the obligation to serve the sovereign, 
or the state represented by the sovereign, in the field, is the essen 
tial obligation or characteristic of the feudal system, then there is 
nothing peculiar about it. The duty of the subject or citizen to render 
military service to the sovereign or state is essential to communal 
life, or societary existence; and it has prevailed and still prevails and 
must continue to prevail, in all communities. 



DEFECTIVE THEORIES OF THE FEUDAL SYSTEM. 6l 

That military service, either to the sovereign or to anybody else 
is not the essential characteristic of feudalism, appears, the moment 
we retrace our author's too rapid steps and revert to the nature of 
those benefices which he has acknowledged to be, as indeed they 
were, the same as fiefs, but which he has apparently forgotten all 
about. In the first place these benefices, when they consisted of 
landed estates, all emanated from the church. In the second place, 
few or none of them were granted to, or by, the church, upon con- 
ditions of military service. In the third place, many benefices or 
fiefs had no more to do with lands than with military services. Princes 
sometimes granted in fief the offices of state, the running of water, 
the profits of coinage, or the tolls of roads and ferries, while pre- 
lates granted in fief the profits of the holy mass, the profits of bap- 
tism, of the churchings of women, or of the sacred winds of heaven. * 

II. Still absorbed with the notion that a benefice or fief was neces- 
sarily and always an estate of land, Mr. Hallam, in another place, 
says: "The essential principle of a fief was a mutual contract of 
support and fidelity." To this it may be replied that such is the na- 
ture of the social contract in all states. Surely there is no suspicion 
of feudalism in the absolute ownership or allodial tenures of the 
United States of America, at the present time. Yet every landowner 
there, as well every man who is not a landowner, is under an im- 
plied, if not an express contract, to be "faithful" to the govern- 
ment, which in return, undertakes to "support" him in his political 
rights. 

III. Mr. Hallam incidentally observes that during the height of 
the feudal system in France, vassals never hesitated to serve their 
lords even against the sovereign, "nor do they appear to have in- 
curred any blame on that account." Having said this much, the 
illustrious author dismissed that portion of his subject which merited 
the greatest attention. The respect, fidelity or allegiance due from 
the subject, not directly to the head of the state, but to the subject's 
patron, or the noble placed next above him in the social scale, and 
by the latter to his lord, and so on upwards to the throne, was one 
of the most characteristic marks of feudality; far more characteristic 
than the holding of land upon condition of performing military ser- 
vice to a patron or sovereign. The latter mark is only to be observed 
after feudalism had made considerable progress; the former can be 
discovered whenever and wherever the feudal system prevailed. It 

* Robertson's Charles V., note H; Guizot, i, 66; Beckman, Hist. Inv., art, "Corn- 
mills." 



02 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

is true that the mark of feudal ordination was not so plain when Ju- 
lius and Augustus first applied the organization and discipline of the 
pagan church to the civil and military systems of the empire, as it 
was, when under Hadrian IV., the church, now Christianized, had 
become all-powerful and its influence all-pervading; but, though only 
faintly impressed, it is to be seen from the outset. The organization 
of ecclesiastical ranks and powers was feudal; the charters of the 
Augustan period, which Josephus has preserved, are feudal; the vi- 
cariously applied powers of the proconsuls and propraetors during the 
whole of the pagan imperial sera was feudal; and the arrangement 
of social ranks, which, beginning in the first century, grew to ma- 
turity by the fifth — the nobillissimi, illustres, spectabiles, clarisimi, 
and perfectisimi — were also feudal. These powers and ranks were 
feudal from the moment that they ceased to be related directly to the 
state or the head of the state and became related to other powers 
and other ranks which stood between them and the state. Mr. Hallam 
employs an erroneous term when he calls the king of France the 
"sovereign of the vassals." He was nothing of the sort. He was 
the suzerain of the nobles. The latter were the sovereigns of the 
vassals, and to them alone, as Mr. Hallam himself admits, was vas- 
salic allegiance due. 

IV. Our author regards "fiefs holden on terms of military service 
as the most ancient and regular " fiefs, forgetting that, in another 
place, he found fiefs still more ancient in those ecclesiastical bene- 
fices which had nothing to do with military service. 

V. Mr. Hallam regards investiture as a characteristic mark of 
feudalism. This is again like regarding the wearing of clothes as the 
characteristic mark of men. The reply is that although there may 
have been no investiture without feudalism, there certainly was feu- 
dalism without investiture. Among those duties of the vassal which 
commenced with investiture, duties which our author unfortunately 
finds it "impossible to define or enumerate," was the duty "never 
to conceal from the lord, the machinations of others." This is ad- 
mitted to be a mark of feudalism, but denied that it is only to be 
discerned in the customs of investiture; for it will be found expressly 
set forth in the Judean charters already cited. These preceded in- 
vestiture by several centuries. 

VI. A similar reply may be made with regard to reliefs, which Mr. 
Hallam confines to the middle ages and describes as "sums of money 
(unless where charter or custom introduced a different tribute) due 
from everyone, of full age, taking a fief by descent." During the 



DEFECTIVE THEORIES OF THE FEUDAL SYSTEM. 6 



>> 



Triumvirate the Senate granted to Herod his fief of Judea, which 
he claimed by descent from Antipater, to whom it had been granted 
by Julius Caesar. The money which Herod paid on this occasion 
(B. C. 40) as well as what he paid ten years later, when he obtained 
a confirmation of his fief and transferred his oath of allegiance to 
Augustus, was according to Mr. Hallam's definition, a relief. There- 
fore reliefs are not to be confined to the middle ages. It may be 
added that they are not to be confined to medieval fiefs. Augustus 
not only exacted a relief from Herod, he exacted one from every 
heir, whether the incumbent of a feudal estate or otherwise. This 
exaction, known as vigesima hgereditatum, or the twentieth of all in- 
heritances, was a tax of purely ecclesiastical origin, the entire pro- 
ceeds of which were probably devoted to the support of the church. 

VII. Mr. Hallam closes his enumeration, not of feudal character- 
istics, but of what he calls "feudal incidents," with a description of 
the "partial customs " concerning wardships and marriages (such as 
feudal servitudes) which distinguish "the maturity of the system." 
This softening of phrases and qualification of terms distinguishes 
every writer on the subject of feudalism, but in Mr. Hallam it is most 
marked. They all appear to be afraid to commit themselves to any 
positive language on the subject: than which there can be no surer 
token of doubt and uncertainty. In this sort of euphemism, "char- 
acteristics" are softened into "incidents," "customs" into "partial 
customs," and "feudalism" into "matured feudalism." The reader 
never knows what he has gained. After fancying the argument to be 
safely anchored in port, he finds it, to his surprise, still tossing about, 
upon an ocean of indefinite phraseology. If a description of the 
feudal system is to be limited only to those characteristics or inci- 
dents which marked its maturity, how are we to determine its origin, 
how long it prevailed, how far it extended, or what mischief it 
wrought? 

VIII. Mr. Hallam — still looking for the channel and never letting 
go of the sounding-line for a moment — parts with his readers by 
warning them against false lights, "against seeming analogies (to 
feudal incidents) which vanish away when they are closely observed. " * 
Among these he enumerates the relation of patron and client, be- 
cause it was not founded upon tenures of land nor military service. 
Yet, according to his own terms, these essential "incidents" of 

^Mr. Hallam's objections to what he regards as "seeming analogies" (Mid. Ages, 
p. 96,) are sharply criticised by Hampson, Origines Patriae, p. 61. 



64 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

feudalism only pertained to the maturity of feudalism and may not 
have distinguished its beginning. His objection to be guided by the 
light of patron and client has therefore, no discernible foundation. 
Another light about which he is very doubtful, is emphyteusis, which 
he accuses the medieval Italian lawyers of wrongly mistaking for a 
feudal tenure, "modes of property somewhat analogous in appear- 
ance, but totally distinct in principle," (p. 95). Yet, in another place, 
he admits that feodum and emphyteusis were often used interchange- 
ably, and that, .for example, under the edict of Peter II., of Aragon, 
1210, it was not always possible to determine whether emphyteusis 
meant a "regular fief," or not. His explanation is that although 
emphyteusis resembles a fief in being an estate of land held upon 
conditions, it differs from a fief in the essential respect that those 
conditions were not military service. It is therefore very evident 
that military service is the sign by means of which this obscure chan- 
nel is attempted to be traced by Mr. Hallam. When it is remem- 
bered that Mr. Hallam himself had shown that fiefs and benefices 
were the same, that benefices were not military, that fiefs were not 
always military, and that, in some instances, it was impossible to 
distinguish emphyteusis from a feudal tenure, the retention of this 
clue is very remarkable. 

Any further examination of Mr. Hallam's views on this subject 
would be futile. It is quite clear that both this author and the sev- 
eral other authors whose opinions he discusses and rejects, were 
conscious of the great difficulty which attended their search for the 
origin of the feudal system in Europe, and of the uncertainty in 
which they were compelled to leave the enquiry; that they never sus- 
pected, at all events never disclosed, any connection between it and 
the Sacred constitution; that, for them, the feudal system possessed 
no necessary relation to the ecclesiastical system; that they never 
regarded the Roman and medieval arrangement of civil, military, 
and ecclesiastical ranks, as peculiarly feudal, or as of sacerdotal 
origin, or as being impossible of achievement and perpetuation with- 
out the consent and co-operation of the church ; that they did not 
regard the inalienability of church-lands as having anything to do 
with the origin of feudal estates; that, excepting Guizot, they saw no 
evidences of the existence of feudalism in the pagan Roman empire, 
or indeed at any earlier period than the Carlovingian sera; and that, 
to all of them, the sign, the mark, the buoy, the clue, the finger-post 
to feudalism, was the hoiding of lands upon condition of military 
service. 



DEFECTIVE THEORIES OF THE FEUDAL SYSTEM. 65 

Whilst we may decline to accept the conclusions drawn by this 
eminent author we are compelled to acknowledge the great value of 
his observations. In this respect, Mr. Hallam's chapters on feudal- 
ism are all that can be desired. The numerous marks and soundings 
of the subject which he has brought together have evidently been 
investigated with care and impartiality. If read closely, it will be 
found that the historian does not altogether deny the Roman origin 
of feudalism; his view seems rather to be that it did not attain the 
maturity of a system until the Carlovingian sera. So far, there is no 
essential disagreement between this view and the one upheld in these 
pages. It is not intended to be maintained that feudalism ripened 
at once into a complete form of government, but that it arose out of, 
and began its development under, the Sacred constitution, was marked 
by precisely the same territorial limits, and received its death blow 
when that constitution expired. So far as feudalism is concerned, 
Mr. Hallam's work leaves the Dark Ages entirely out of view. In the 
present work this period is attempted to be brought into relief. The 
essential difference in the two theories relates to the origin of feu- 
dalism. Mr. Hallam can only discover this in the supposed military 
tenures of the Goths; the search-light of the Sacred empire enables 
us to discern it in the necessities and institutes of the Romans; 
among which were military tenures granted before the Goths domi- 
nated Europe. The Gothic clue led Mr. Hallam to base a limited 
structure of feudalism upon certain eccentric and (from his point of 
view) unaccountable tenures of land. The sacerdotal clue not only 
accounts quite readily for these tenures, it affords a much broader 
and more ancient foundation for the superstructure, and enables us 
to perceive and admit fuller and more varied proportions to the latter. 

Read by the light of the Sacred empire even the materials brought 
together by Mr. Hallam point to the Roman origin and the broader 
features of feudalism to which we have alluded. For example, Mr. 
Hallam distinctly asserts of the Franks under Clovis that the Romans, 
or rather the provincial inhabitants of Gaul, were not only possessed 
of lands, but that they were governed by the Roman law and admit- 
ted to the royal favour and the highest offices; that the bishops and 
clergy, who were usually Romans, grew continually in popular esti- 
mation, in riches and in temporal sway and authority; that while one 
class of Romans retained estates of their own, another class, scarcely 
raised above the condition of praedial servitude, were tributaries 
upon estates owned either by the former or by Franks; thus proving 
that Frankish chieftains did not monopolise the offices of state; nor 



66 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

Frankish priests the profits of the church; nor Frankish owners the 
fruits of the land; nor Frankish judges the tribunals of justice. The 
fact that the Salic law was grafted upon the Roman, lends great sig- 
nificance to Mr. Hallam's recognition of numerous other orders of 
nobility, beside those which appear in the were-gilds, such as patrician, 
antrustion, conviva regis, commoner, bishop, abbot, duke, count, 
and knight. He also recognizes commoners, landowners, freemen, 
fideles, leudes, tributaries, servi, coloni, fiscalini, and other social 
grades, and avers that the feudal system was characterized by "long 
graduations and numerous duties." He admits that every man both 
in France and Italy had the right to choose by which law, whether 
Roman or Gothic, he would be governed; that so early as 570, the 
Lombard dukes of Spoleto and Benevento embraced in their newly 
founded duchies " a sort of feudal aristocracy ;" that fideles and leudes 
were favourite subjects or royal vassals of the Frankish kings upon 
whom benefices for life had been bestowed out of the lands of the 
fisc, and who, in common with the antrustions, took oaths of fidelity 
to their prince; that in the Salic and Lombard codes favorable ex- 
ceptions were made in favour of such vassals; that the benefices of 
the antrustions were hereditary and the language of the treaty of 
Andely, A. D. 587, implied the existence of other hereditary bene- 
fices (we suggest that these were of ecclesiastical lands) ; that "who- 
ever possessed a benefice (within our author's meaning) was bound 
to serve his sovereign in the field; " that the beneficiary " naturally 
carved out portions of his land to be held of himself by a similar 
tenure " and so on, in turn, down to the last holder; and in the in- 
stance of Sunegisilius and Gallomagnus, two favorites of Childebert, 
their benefices were confiscated for neglect or refusal to perform 
military service; that the estates of counts were usually co-extensive 
with episcopal dioceses (this implies the confiscation of the pagan 
church lands by the secular authority) ; that the counts grievously 
oppressed the poorer proprietors (this would be the natural complaint 
of the church when, having fastened " the yoke of the Gospel " upon 
the barbarians, it demanded the restoration of these confiscated 
lands) ; that Salvian, a priest who died about A. D. 500, mentions 
the custom of commendation as existing "even before the invasion 
of the Franks; " that commendation resembled the Roman relation 
of patron and client ; that it enabled the lower classes of freemen, upon 
payment of homage and tribute, to secure the protection of the no- 
bles and exemption from military service; that both Frankish and 
Anglo-Saxon laws of Christian dates provided that every man should 



DEFECTIVE THEORIES OF THE FEUDAL SYSTEM. 67 

own a lord; that the "essential principle" of a fief was a mutual con- 
tract of support and fidelity, and that the sanctions of religion were 
employed to strengthen the tie; but that the "real principle" of a 
fief was an arrangement of land holders "in degrees of subordina- 
tion according to their respective capacities of affording mutual sup- 
port; " that prelates and abbots were, ex-officio, feudal nobles; that 
military service was not reserved in grants of land made by the State 
to the Church; that many private persons conveyed their lands, and 
even their persons as slaves to the church in return for its blessing, 
and, (it may be added,) exemption from military service; that mili- 
tary service was not reserved in the beneficiary grants made by the 
church; that the feudal system in Europe was strictly confined to the 
limits of the Roman empire; that it did not exist in Norway, Sweden, 
Finland, Denmark, Saxony, Hungary, Venice, old Bohemia, Poland, 
or Russia; that the Milanese lawyers claimed it was of Roman origin 
and the Argonese fiefs were often granted, to use their own word?, 
"according to the custom of Italy." 

It is remarkable that with all this evidence pointing to the Roman 
origin, the sacerdotal nature and the varied composition, of the feu- 
dal system, Mr. Hallam should have permitted his views upon the 
subject to be limited by the verbal clue of feoh. This course is still 
more remarkable when it is remembered that he had already traced 
feudal tenures back to Roman benefices, a clue far more suggestive 
and promising than feoh, and totally unconnected with it, and that 
he cites Sweno, one of the earliest of Gothic writers, to prove that 
feoh was not a fief, but an "honour or government." But most re- 
markable does Mr. Hallam's course seem when he must have discov- 
ered that the adoption of feoh led to nothing but barren conjectures 
concerning the polity of tribes who had no polity and the useless 
elevation into gospel of thatpleasingbutimpossible Germania, which 
Tacitus, the accomplished priest and historian, constructed out of 
some Roman log-book and designed rather for a homily to his heret- 
ical and degenerate countrymen, than a serious and actual descrip- 
tion of barbarian manners. 

The prepossession which appears to have misled Mr. Hallam was 
still more pronounced with Dr. Robertson, for it induced that eminent 
scholar to reject the plainest marks of the Roman origin of feudalism 
and to accept a totally improbable theory in place of it. Says the 
author of the Life of Charles the Fifth: "Though the barbarous na- 
tions which framed the feudal system settled in their new territories 



68 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

at different times, came from different countries, spoke various lan- 
guages and were under the command of separate leaders, the feudal 
policy and laws were established with little variation in every king- 
dom in Europe. This amazing uniformity (amazing indeed if feu- 
dalism was of barbarian origin!) hath induced some authors, for 
example Procopius, to believe that all these nations, notwithstand- 
ing so many apparent circumstances of distinction, were originally 
the same people. But it may be ascribed with greater probability to 
the similar state of society and of manners to which they were accus- 
tomed in their native countries and to the similar situation in which 
they found themselves on taking possession of their new domains." 

A weaker argument could hardly have been advanced. It does not 
account for the fact that there was no feudalism among those bar- 
barians whohad not previouslybeen conquered by the Romans; norfor 
the fact that its extinction synchronised with that of the Roman em- 
pire; nor for the fact that feudal systems in other countries were all 
connected with hierarchies and all hierarchies with feudal systems; 
nor for the feudal charters of Roman Judea; nor for the identity of 
fiefs and benefices and the origin of benefices in the inalienable lands 
of a church; nor for the ecclesiastical nature and ancient origin of 
feudal ranks and feudal government; nor for numerous other facts 
pertaining to feudalism. And what are we offered in place of a theory 
that should account for these facts? The assumption that Goths, Huns, 
Franks, and Sclavs all lived in a similar state of society in their own 
countries and found themselves in a similar situation when they set- 
tled in Europe: an assumption which the historian himself flatly con- 
tradicts on another page of his work, where he says that " while the 
barbarous nations remained in their original countries they had no 
fixed property in land and no certain limits to their possessions." 

It is a pity that this familiarity with the ancient customs of the 
barbarians — who had and who hadn't a fixed property in land, who 
did and who didn't hanker after lands whose tenures were burdened 
with dangerous and often degrading conditions, and who were and 
who weren't the inventors and introducers into Europe of the feudal 
system — it was a pity that all this information was not communicated 
to M. Guizot, for that other eminent writer on the same subject says: 
"The customs and social condition of the barbarians have completely 
perished." As Dr. Robertson who wrote in 1785 appeared to know 
all about them and M. Guizot who wrote in 1824 could learn nothing 
about them, the knowledge of these customs must have all perished 
during the interval. 



DEFECTIVE THEORIES OF THE FEUDAL SYSTEM. 69 

In describing the mode by which, in accordance with his theory, 
the barbarians transplanted their foreign feudal system into Europe, 
Dr. Robertson says : ' ' Every freeman upon receiving a portion of the 
lands, which were divided, bound himself to appear in arms against 
the enemies of the community." No evidence is offered to prove that 
lands were so divided. On the contrary, the facts are that a vast 
number of the estates, certainly all the ecclesiastical ones, which 
were in the possession of Roman owners before the revolts of the 
barbarians, remained in the possession of Roman owners after the 
termination of such revolts, and that those barbarians, who were not 
merely Roman vassals or subjects in revolt, such as the Norsemen 
and Norse-Saxons, cared little or nothing about lands or other spoil 
that was not portable. " The obligation to appear in arms against 
the enemies of the community — even if admitted to have existed 
under a system which was distinguished by personal obligations, and 
which rarely provided for any of a communal character — was not 
peculiar to feudal states, for it is common to all communities, indeed 
we would prefer to say that it is common to all systems of society 
except the feudal system. For the purpose of accentuating that mili- 
tary obligation which he assumed to lie at the basis of feudalism, the 
historian says of the holders of fiefs: "They were exempt from every 
other burden," an assertion in support of which he offers no proof 
at all. In another place and to further illustrate his theory, he com- 
mences by dividing all the lands of the Roman empire among the bar- 
barians whom he assumes to have conquered such lands. Then, in order 
to account for that subordination of estates which according to his 
view first makes its appearance after this event, he divides the land 
again, this time not among the barbarians generally, but only among 
the chieftains, so that the latter may "distribute portions of their 
lands among their dependents, annexing the same conditions (of 
military service with no other burden) to the grant." This redistri- 

* Instead of fancying from the barbarian origin of the word feoh that the barbarians 
brought feudalism into Europe, Dr. Robertson might have easily discovered that they 
had no feudal elements whatever in their social structure. The Eddas and Sagas 
would have given him the communal organizations of the herad and the fylki, and 
had he suspected that these had been altered, as no doubt they had been by contact 
with the Romans, he might have found the original institute still flourishing in Russia 
under the name of mir. It was with this Mongolian institute and not the selection 
of a patron, or suzerain, (which the Romans taught him,) that the barbarian thrall pro- 
tected himself against the oppression of the jarl; and it is in this institute that his 
descendants still find, in the absence of a better one, some sort of a refuge from 
tyranny. 



70 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

bution among chieftains of lands that had once been parcelled out 
among the conquering rank and file is hardly supported by the story 
which our author quotes from Gregory of Tours, of the vase which 
Clovis coveted, over and above his share of spoil, but which one of 
his men shattered to pieces before his eyes, saying j "There is noth- 
ing for you here beyond your share. " Fancy Dr. Robertson proposing 
redistribution to a warrior of this stamp! * A more serious objection 
to this theory is the consideration that the existence of a class of 
dependents not entitled to a share of the lands in the first place and 
of chieftains with power to annex conditions of military service to 
subsequent grants of such lands, bespeak the institution of a feudal 
system anterior to the one for whose origin the historian endeavours 
to account. In one place (p. 15) he says that "the names of a soldier 
and of a freeman were synonymous," in another (p. 20) that these 
soldiers had "superiors" to whom they were bound by feudal obli- 
gations, and in a third that feudal institutions destroyed both equality 
and independence; positions which are evidently so contradictory as 
to deprive his general argument on the subject of all force. 

The views of M. Guizot, where they differ from those which have 
herein been discussed, are certainly very peculiar. In his first allu- 
sion to feudalism (Hist. Civ., I, 41,) he very justly calls it an " aris- 
tocratical organization " derived from "hierarchical subordination." 
Then, wholly ignoring the meaning of hieras, sacred, he traces this 
form of society to the attachment of man to man, and therefore, ac- 
cording to his reasoning, feudalism to the barbarians. In one place 
he says that wherever barbarism appeared within the empire there 
arose feudalism, in another (p. 66) he says "wherever barbarism 
ceased^ everything took the feudal form." In one place, (p. 70), he 
says that the importance of a Roman patrician was due to the law, 
while "that of the possessor of a fief was purely individual, it was 
not derived from any one, all his rights, all his power came to him 
from himself." In another place, (p. 75), he says that "every one 

' The Story of the Vase as told by Almoin of Aquitaine, Hist, of France, (lib. i, c. 
12,) is very different from the version of the Croniques de St. Denis. The former 
says: " Clovis, in 486, took Rheims and plundered the church of its plate. The bishop 
requested him to restore a silver chalice to the church, and Clovis assented, subject to 
the advice of his council. Calling the principal barons and knights together he asked 
their decision, when one of them stepped forward and cut the chalice in two with his 
sword, saying: ' You have no concern with anything here but what belongs to you by 
lot.' " Hampson's Origines Patricije, pp. Iviii, 9. This little drama might easily have 
been arranged beforehand. 



DEFECTIVE THEORIES OF THE FEUDAL SYSTEM. 71 

knows that feudalism desired legally to determine what were the 
services due from the possessor of the fief towards his suzerain." In 
one place the tendency and result of feudalism is separation and social 
isolation; in another place, (p. 79), the idea of feudalism was in fact, 
that of a federation; for example, "like the United States of Amer- 
ica. " In one place the feudal system is the most complex of all sys- 
tems of society, one for which "a very advanced degree of civiliza- 
tion is evidently requisite ;' in another, it was invented and introduced 
by ignorant and savage barbarians. 

However, the crowning effort of this illustrious author is reserved 
for the mention of that material criterion by which the existence of 
the feudal system is always susceptible of being determined with 
certainty. This is castles. Feudalism and castles are always found 
together. The presence of one betokens the other. "Feudalism 
constructed them," and "their elevation was, so to speak, the decla- 
ration of its triumph." Then because, as he believed, "nothing of 
the kind (that is, castles,) existed on the Gallo-Roman soil before 
the German invasion," he argues that there could have been no feu- 
dalism before the occurrence of that highly mythical event. It would 
certainly be instructive to learn what sort of castles the "Germans," 
that is, the Goths and Huns, erected in the countries from which 
they imported feudalism into Europe, and how they managed to main- 
tain the feudal system in the interval of abandoning one set of castles 
and erecting the other; but our author does not enlighten us on these 
points, nor does he appear to remember that long before the so-called 
"German Invasion" the Romans built or reconstructed castles on 
the Gallic soil and by these very means held it as a province of Rome ; 
that many of the ancient castles of the Rhine whose picturesque de- 
cay render that stream so interesting to the modern traveller, were 
built by the Romans; ® that they built numerous castles in Britain; ^ 
that Josephus describes many Roman castles in Syria; that the ruins 
of others have been found in all of their provinces, and in some in- 
stances beyond them, as the Roman castles in the Desert of Sahara; 
and indeed that the more ancient Greeks constructed castles in My- 
cenae, Tiryns, Troy and other places. 

As for the tiresome argument which M. Guizot repeats, that feu- 
dalism must be of barbarian origin because feud is from feoh and the 
latter is the Gothic word for a cow, it is hardly worth refutation. In 
addition to being grotesquely illogical, it is wholly irrelevant. Feu- 

* Sir F, Palgrave, i, 353 ; Tacitus, Annales, iv, 73. ' Juvenal, xiv, 19''. 



72 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

dalism is an institution, a thing; not a mere word. It is the origin, 
not of the word, but of the thing that we seek, and that origin in the 
Western world we find to be Roman. Whether the thing afterwards 
got a barbarian name or not, does not seem to us — with all respect 
for M. Guizot — to be of the slightest possible consequence. 

Next we turn to Mr. Buckle. This justly eminent author believed 
neither in Dr. Robertson's cow nor M. Guizot's castles. In place of 
these historical theories he proposes a new one. Feudalism according 
to this view, was an unfolded plan of government, based on an indefi- 
nite relation of land and services, which arose in no stated place, out 
of a rebellion of the intellect, that occurred during some unmentioned 
portion of the tenth century. Briefly, our author regards the feudal 
system to be an entirely secular plan of government which emerged 
from the medieval Rebellion of the Human Intellect that, he asserts, 
occurred against the rottenness of the Christian church. The proofs 
relied upon to sustain this theory of feudalism are as follows: First, 
"the basis of the whole arrangement was merely the possession of 
land and the performance of certain military and pecuniary services." 
Second, in the feudal polity the spiritual classes, as such, had no 
recognized place. Instead of looking up to the head of the church, men 
looked up to the nobles. Thus, by the feudal revolution, the nobles 
gained and the bishops lost, at least so we are assured, says Mr. 
Buckle, by the abbe Mably. Third, after the occurrence of the feu- 
dal revolution (in other words, the rebellion of the human intellect 
against the corruption of the church) priests and monks were no 
longer exempt from military services. "Under the feudal system 
this immunity was lost, and in regard to performing services, no sep- 
aration of classes was admitted." Mr. Buckle has added such a mass 
of valuable information on other subjects to the general stock of our 
knowledge, that it seems almost impious to roughly handle anything 
that he has touched; but as it is impossible to build anew, whilst old 
materials cumber the ground, so must even those which he has left 
behind, be removed, though ever so reverently, from the site of the 
proposed Edifice. 

I. Mr. Buckle asserts that the basis of the whole arrangement was 
land. If the ' ' whole arrangement " within our author's meaning was 
land, it is evident that its basis must also have been land, but as he 
has not defined nor described the " whole arrangement " it is impos- 
sible to discern with precision what relation it bears to the feudal 
system. The inference of the entirely secular character of the latter 



DEFECTIVE THEORIES OF THE FEUDAL SYSTEM. 73 

therefore falls to the ground. If, by the whole arrangement is meant 
the whole feudal system, the notion that it was merely a system of 
landed estates, is so fully refuted elsewhere in these pages that the 
argument needs no further elaboration. 

II. Our author asserts that in the feudal polity the spiritual classss, 
as such, had no recognized place. This is an assertion that flies in 
the face of all history. In the feudal polity the spiritual classes not 
only had a recognized place, they made all the places, reserving for 
themselves the best ones. They not only stood behind the throne 
of the emperor, they placed their feet upon it and employed it to 
work all those feudal puppets whom they did not choose to work 
directly from the papal throne. The church was the parent of feu- 
dalism, and dutifully imitatingits own Jupiter, lived upon its progeny; 
for feudalism kept communities and princes apart, and in that con- 
dition rendered them more amenable to ecclesiastical avidity and 
control. It was the pontifex-maximus that, by veiling his sacred 
person from the world, created those numerous social ranks and that 
peculiar subordination which distinguished the feudal system of caste; 
it was the church that by fastening the yoke of the gospel upon the 
necks of the northern and western barbarians saved the empire from 
that complete overthrow which it suffered at the hands of the eastern 
and southern barbarians, and having saved it, at once proceeded to 
rule it; it was the church that, having acquired spiritual control of 
the northern and western princes, immured many of them in the 
monastic tombs of Rome in order that it might more readily direct 
the policy and grasp the revenues of the others; it was the church 
that having gained temporal possession for the Lord, of more than 
half of northern and western Europe, stocked its estates with white 
slaves, sometimes more than 20,000 to a single abbot, and leased or 
granted these estates as benefices or fiefs for the ultimate advantage, 
not of the Lord, but of the Lord's annointed ; it was the church which 
so organized the ranks of nobles and ecclesiastics that, after the 
people " looked up to the nobles," the latter were obliged to look up 
to the readers, exorcists, clerks, priests, vicars, abbots, prelates, 
electors, legates, cardinals, and pontifex-maximus who surrounded 
or filled the throne of Rome and dispensed its favours or anathemas; 
finally, it was the church that first held inalienable landed estates, 
which, because they belonged to the Lord, could not be sold, and 
therefore had to be leased out, or granted for a term of years, or for 
a life time, or forever, on conditions of an annual payment of pro- 
duce or services, and constituted those benefices or fiefs or feuds, 



74 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

which our author supposes to have been derived from some fancied 
rebellion of the medieval intellect. * 

III. Mr. Buckle asserts that after the introduction of the feudal 
system, an event which he assigns to the tenth century, ecclesiastics 
were no longer exempt from military service. It would be interesting 
to know who had the power and opportunity to repeal a millennium 
of Sacred law on this subject, or having such power and opportunity, 
dared to make use of it. Was it any of the petty princes of the tenth 
century, whether already immured in priestly dungeons, or liable to 
be so immured, whenever the priests gave the signal? Was it Otho, 
the suzerain of these princes, who received his crown upon his knees 
from the pope and whose empire was called the Holy Roman? Was 
it Henry who stood barefooted without the pope's door at Canossa, 
abjectly soliciting the forgiveness of his Holiness? Or was it the 
pope himself, who subjected the ecclesiastical to the temporal power 
by repealing the military exemption, or the priests, who voluntarily 
renounced the spiritual and took up the temporal sword? These 
questions at once indicate the improbability of Mr. Buckle's theory. 
It is inconceivable that the church repealed, or permitted the repeal 
of, a privilege which formed the main support of its authority and 
one which if abandoned to its enemies might have been employed for 
its destruction by sending all its adherents to the front. As a matter 
of history, so far was this privilege from any danger of being repealed, 
nobody ever suggested such a measure, and the privilege exists at the 
present day in every state that has issued from the prolific womb of 
Roman civilization. It is true that it has long since lost its import- 
ance, but so also has the feudal system and the Sacred empire, and 
many other institutes of antiquity. 

The spirit in which Bishop William Stubbs approaches the study of 
the subject would hardly entitle his views on feudalism to considera- 
tion in this place were it not that as a teacher of history he happens 
to occupy the foremost place in England. In his "Lectures on 
Medieval and Modern History " he disinguishes (p. 15) between "one 
sort of truth " and another, between ordinary truth, and Christian 
truth, evidently regarding the latter as of a much superior quality. 
At the same time he fails to discern the difference between philoso- 
phy and "philosophic sciolism " (p. 8). He maintains that history 
is a religious training, but inferior as such to theology, because the 

^ Brady, Clavis Calendaria, shows where a priest claimed his order to be superior to 
the gods. 



DEFFXTIVE THEORIES OF THE FEUDAL SYSTEM. 75 

latter "rests on a divine revelation" (p. lo); that "the principle of 
freedom was brought into the world and proclaimed and made pos- 
sible by the church " (p. i8) ; that the church is " the soul and spirit 
of all true civilization, of all true liberty, of all true knowledge" 
(p. i8); that there is no unity or continuity of ancient and modern 
history, (p. 98,) except in religion and in that only because the 
Christian dispensation connects the Flood (p. 134) and other be- 
liefs of "the ancient Hebrew isolation, with the great Catholic 
church life" (p. 99); that "except as a matter of culture the an- 
cient world is dead to us" (p. loS); that as a field for fresh and 
remunerative exploration it is useless to search the classical his- 
torians, "every bone of the great (historical) skeleton having long 
been put into its place " (p. 88) ; that "ancient history exercises the 
critical faculty in a comparatively exhausted field" (p. 109); that 
modern nations inherit no political institutes but only ecclesiastical 
culture from the Roman empire (p. 99); that "the ideas of medieval 
and modern life are of medieval and modern growth, or if connected 
with antiquity, connected by a new birth of culture, a re-discovery, 
a re-creation, not a continuous impulse of vitality " (p. 99) ; and that 
the twelfth century "originated the forms in which our national and 
constitutional life began to mould itself" (p. 136). 

After this astonishing prelude it occasions no surprise to be told in 
his "Constitutional History of England," that "feudalism was of 
distinctly Frank growth. The principle which underlies it may be 
universal, but the historical development of it . . . may be traced 
under Frank influence from its first appearance on the conquered soil 
of Roman Gaul to its full development in the Middle Ages" (p. 250); 
that "feudalism in England was brought full grown from France" 
(p. 25 1 ;/) ; that the growth of the feudal system is correctly explained 
only by Dr. Waitz, who lucidly accounts for it "on the theory of a 
conjunction and interpenetration of the beneficial system and the 
vassal relation, both being fostered by the growth of immunities" 
(p. 251 n); that "this institution (feudalism) had grown up from two 
great sources, the beneficiumand the practice of commendation and 
had been specially fostered on Gallic soil by the existence of a sub- 
ject population which admitted of any amount of extension in the 
methods of dependence" (p. 252); that "the beneficiary system 
originated partly in gifts of land made by the kings out of their own 
estates to the kinsmen and servants, with a special understanding to 
be faithful . . . (and) partly in the surrender by land owners of their 
estates to churches or powerful men to be received back again and 



76 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

held by them as tenants for rent or services" (p. 252); that "the 
union of the beneficiary tie with that of commendation completed the 
idea of feudal obligation " (p. 253) ; that "a third ingredient wassup- 
plied by the grants of immunity by which, in the Frank empire, as 
in England, the possession of land was united with the right of judi- 
cature" (p. 253); that "the rapid spread of the system thus origi- 
nated may be regarded as the work of the tenth century, but as early 
as A. D. 877 Charles the Bald recognized the hereditary character of 
all benefices and from that year the growth of strictly feudal juris- 
prudence maybe held to date" (p. 253); that "the beneficium is 
partly of Roman, partly of German origin" (p. 254); and that, "in 
the form which it reached at the Norman conquest, it (feudalism) 
may be described as a complete organization of society through the 
medium of land tenure" (p. 251). 

With all respect for the accomplished Regius Professor of Modern 
History, it is submitted that these views, most of which are confess- 
edly borrowed from a German writer, Dr. Georg Waitz, wholly fail 
to account for the origin of the feudal system or to describe any 
other phase of it than the matured one which it reached during the 
middle ages, and that even as to that one the description lacks both 
clearness, completeness, and precision. It does not explain the re- 
semblance and connection of hierarchical and feudal governments, the 
sacerdotal origin of feudal rank, the involution of feudal castes, the 
similar ordination of nobles and priests, the inalienable tenures of 
ecclesiastical lands, nor the existence of feudalism in America before 
the Spanish conquest, in England before the Norman conquest, in 
Gaul before the Frankish conquest, in Egypt and Asia Minor before 
the Roman conquest, or in the various countries of the Orient. Nor 
is Dr. Stubbs consistent. On one page (251 n) he tells us that 
Montesquieu's view, (namely, that the bond of amity in feudalism 
was the connection of classes in subordination to one another) though 
accepted by the learned Eichhorn, has since been entirely refuted by 
Dr. Waitz, whilst, on another page (256), he describes "feudal gov- 
ernment (as) a graduated system of jurisdiction based on land tenure, 
in which every lord judged, taxed, and commanded the class next 
below him;" and thus contradicts himself and discredits his author. 
In short, the opinions of Dr. Stubbs as to the origin and nature of 
feudalism, seem very much confused and contain but little that had 
not already been said and said much better by the illustrious Hallam, 
Robertson and Guizot. 



77 



CHAPTER V. 

HIERARCHICAL ORIGIN OF FEUDALISM. 

Feudal systems of Asia, Africa and Aboriginal America — They all sprang from 
hierarchies — Were all associated with inalienable lands consecrated to the Church — 
Synchronism in the rise and fall of all hierarchies and feudal systems — Recent case of 
Japan — Feudalism always marked by vicarious government — European feudalism be- 
gan with Julius Caesar and ended with the Reformation — It was strictly confined to 
the Roman empire — The deification of Julius C;Esar rendered it necessary to surround 
him with descending ranks of nobles and priests — Such involved systems of caste pecu- 
liar to all hierarchies — Roman nobles and priests were similarly ordained: a proof of 
their hierarchical connection — The Roman hierarchy and feudalism rose and fell and 
flourished and faded together — Benefices, their origin, nature and history — Avidity 
and great wealth of the pagan church — Its lands, tithes and slaves — Gratian confis- 
cates them — Theodosius bestows them on the "christian " church — The Barbarian Con- 
quest, an invention by the monks — The barbarians did not destroy; they conserved 
the Roman empire — Gradual growth of feudalism — Proconsuls, who under the Com- 
monwealth, were merely imperial officers; under the empire, became feudal monarchs 
— Clovis, Theodoret, Sigismund, Athaulf — Ancient roots of certain customs of feudal- 
ism — Renewals and reliefs — These found in the Julian charters — Patron and Client — 
Land grants — Military service to nobles — Slavery — Emphyteusis. 



PHYSICAL science has taught us the advantage which is sometimes 
to be gained by examining the spectrum of an object, rather 
than the object itself. It is in photographs that we now study the 
glimpses of the moon and from the analysis of light and the nature 
of gases, that we gather the story of the stars. In somewhat similar 
manner let us endeavor to read the riddle of European feudalism by 
examining such accounts as have reached us of feudalism in other 
countries. These comprise India, China, Japan, Persia, Babylon, 
Syria, Egypt, and Mexico, whose feudal systems are mentioned 
elsewhere.' 

A striking discovery rewards us at once. It is impossible not to 
notice that in all these countries the government was a sacred one, 
that it promulgated sacred laws, that it exercised ecclesiastical powers, 
and that the chief magistrate was a priest, usually the high-priest, 
and in some instances was worshipped as a god. Thus feudalism and 

' See Appendix A and the authorities therein adduced. Some of these, (for instance, 
Prescott,) are unwilling witnesses. It is therefore to the facts they narrate and not 
the opinions they advance that reference is here made. 



78 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

sacred government are found together. Nor is this connection merely- 
accidental, but natural and inevitable. Take the case of a feudal 
benefice in Ceylon described by Fa-hian, who visited that country 
about A. D. 400. He says that the king ordered the clergy to repair 
the roads and decorate them for a religious procession in honour of a 
relic tooth of Buddha; that he (the king) took charge of another 
religious ceremony relative to the death of an arhat; that he had the 
right of access to the sacred depositories; and that he was a devout 
follower of Buddha ; from all of which it is evident that he was a priest, 
probably the high-priest, as well as a king, and that his government 
was a sacred one. Having determined to consecrate a new vihara for 
a community of priests: "First of all he provided for them a grand 
banquet, then selecting a pair of strong working-oxen, ornamenting 
their horns with gold, silver, and other precious things and seizing a 
beautiful gilded plough, the king ploughed the outlines of an allotted 
area (about fifteen acres) and ceding all right over the land, houses and 
people, within such area, he presented the whole to the priests, with 
a metal plate, containing the following inscription : — ' From this time 
and for all generations hereafter, let this property be handed down 
from priest to priest and let no one dare to alienate it or change the 
character of this grant.' " A similar ceremony was observed by the 
pontifex-maximus of Rome at the consecration of temples, monas- 
teries and cities;^ a similar character of inalienability is found at- 
tached to the earliest Roman benefices; and a similar disposition was 
made of the people dwelling upon property granted to the church. 
The sovereign of Rome, like the monarch of Ceylon, virtually ' ' ceded 
all right over them;" they became attached to the land; and thence- 
forth belonged to its sacred beneficiary, as feudal vassals. They could 
not even be conscripted for the military service of the empire. 

Altars, temples, monasteries, shrines, sepulchres, cemeteries, eccle- 
siastical lands and all other things consecrated by the Roman pontiff, 
were inalienable. The ownership of them vested in the church and 
could not be transferred. Whatever was thus consecrated was ever 
afterwards inapplicable to profane uses. That which belonged to the- 
gods could not become the property of a mortal.^ 

■ Adams, Roman Antiq., 61. 62. 

^ Pliny, Epist. ix, 39, x, 58, 59, 76; Macrobius, Sat., in, 3, In respect of Cicero's 
house and in some other exceptional cases, the property, after being forfeited to the 
church, was restored to its former owners; but this could only be done after the formal- 
ity of a successful appeal to the Sacred College and a Unanimous vote of the Senate 
in its favor; both of them very rare and difficult processes. Cicero, pro Domo sua; 
Ferg., HI, 43. 



HIERARCHICAL ORIGIN OF FEUDALISM, 79 

In searching for that substantial synchronism between hierarchical 
government and feudalism, which if our conclusions be well founded, 
should attend both their establishment and overthrow, the historical 
evidence, except in a single instance, is either confused or lost. 
Arabian feudalism submerged that of India; Mantchu feudalism that 
of China; Roman feudalism that of Asia Minor and Egypt; and 
Spanish feudalism, the feudal systems of Mexico and Peru. 

The exceptional case relates to Japan, where the native feudal 
system, instead of being mingled and confused with other feudal sys- 
tems, or lost in the unknown institutes of an ancient government, 
perished in recent times and from an obvious cause. The feudal sys- 
tem of Japan fell in the domestic revolution of Meiji, it perished on 
the day that the Mikado abjured Bramo-Shintoism, renounced his 
claim to divine origin and authority, and became a Tenno, or tem- 
poral sovereign, armed only with mortal powers and professing the 
more ancient and simple creed of Buddhism. The daimios and 
higher clergy were compelled to surrender to the imperial crown their 
usurped prerogatives of private war, justice, spiritual dictation, mili- 
tary control, subinfeudation, revenues, coinage, etc., their troops or 
retainers were dismissed, their strongholds were occupied by impe- 
rial forces, their lands became vested in the imperial government, and 
their mints were closed forever. 

The synchronism in the fall of a sacred government and a feudal 
system, which this case presents, corroborates the theory of their 
interdependence, and renders it unnecessary to search any farther for 
the nature and origin of European feudalism. It is now seen to have 
been that condition of society (and it may be added, of land tenures,) 
which naturally and inevitably results from hierarchical government. 
It was an implied article in all sacred constitutions. The character- 
istics by which it has hitherto been identified, are accidental and not 
essential. They are derived from institutes older than feudalism, but 
adopted and altered by feudalism until they became identified with it. 
The essential characteristic of feudalism everywhere, is hierarchical, 
and therefore vicarious, government ; with which it always, and without 
which it never, existed. The deification of man is an insult to Nature, 
who avenges herself by branding the impious worship with a lasting de- 
fect. The unnatural character of an hierarchy is manifested in its contin- 
ual tendency to govern vicariously, and therefore to govern badly. It 
is a form of government which is born with a fatal disease. It is 
the product of a blasphemous fiction, to maintain which it is always 
obliged to exercise its powers indirectly. The resulting proctorage 



8o THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED, 

and sub-proctorage of authority and the multiplication and subordina- 
tion of titles, ranks, offices and landed estates, constitute what is 
known as a feudal system. " 

The history of Roman feudalism accords with this view. It began, 
in point of time, with the Sacred government established by Julius 
Caesar and is unmistakedly manifested in the charters of government 
and rights of coinage granted by that pagan divinity and his divine 
son Augustus. ^ It ended, in point of time, with the protestant refor- 
mation of the i6th century. It was limited in territorial extension 
by the actual boundaries of the Sacred empire. It prevailed in every 
country which that empire included and was nowhere to be found be- 
yond its confines. Certain extrinsic or accidental forms which it 
took, were due to those peculiar roots — such as patron and client, 
emphyteusis, Roman slavery and the Roman military system — which 
lay in the ground before feudalism was planted. Its hierarchical 
origin is betrayed in every feature. Its inalienable lands, its benefices, 
fiefs, or feuds, were all of ecclesiastical origin: its systems of civil 
and religious subordination of ranks, were organized upon a common 
basis and connected together. Indeed the prayers, confessions, fast- 
ings, baths, vigils, vows, red-robes, tonsures, and other ceremonies 
and observances of knighthood, often render it difficult to determine 
where the priest ended and the noble began. * 

If it be asked why feudalism is regarded as the natural embodiment 
or outcome of a Sacred constitution, the answer is that while temporal 
monarchs are enabled to strengthen their power by direct personal 

* Grants of land on condition of performing military services are of the highest an- 
tinquity. Lycurgus made grants of this character in vSparta. Pinkerton, " Origin and 
Progress of the Ancient Goths," p. 139. Similar grants are attributed to Romulus 
and Alexander. Sylla settled his veterans upon the lands of Fsesulse, Cortona and 
Arretium. Julius Cresar granted the lands of Capena and Volaterra to his veterans 
upon condition of military service. Augustus made similar grants. Alexander Severus 
granted lands upon a similar tenure to the duces limitaris, or dukes to whom he com- 
mitted the safety of the limits, or frontiers. Probus made grants of land in Isauria 
to his veterans on condition of military service, Vopiscus, in Prob., xvi. Selden, 
298, regards these grants as feudal. Grants of like nature, made by this emperor in 
Gaul and Britain, are alluded to elsewhere in the present work. 

^ Lenormant, who brought an intimate knowledge of coins and great learning to the 
elucidation of the Right of Coinage, tried hard to avoid admitting that the sovereign- 
pontiff of Rome was the lawful suzerain of the European princes, but at last conceded 
the point by having to employ the terms " I'emperor suzerain et les rois vassaux." 
See " Monnaie dans I'Antiquite," 11, 197. 

* In a moment of inspiration Sir Francis Palgrave almost hits upon the truth. " The 
first chapters of the history of feudality must be sought in the decrees of the Senate 
and the rescripts of the Csesars." Eng. Com., 1, 77. 



HIERARCHICAL ORIGIN OF FEUDALISM. 8l 

contact with, and influence over, their subjects, sacred monarchs are 
obliged, by the loftiness of their supernatural pretensions, to withdraw 
from the public gaze and forego the advantages of contact and pop- 
ularity. They dare only deal with that exalted classs; the kings, 
cardinals, or comes palatini, whom they have placed'*next to them- 
selves in rank. The deified Julius appears in his statues and coins 
covered with a veil. Augustus was repeatedly absent in the prov- 
inces, whence he returned to Rome always in a secret manner. In 
the city he dwelt in a retired portion of his palace, a lofty chamber, 
which he'called Syracuse, and he commonly supped alone. ' Tiberius, 
though he found it necessary to protest himself only a mortal, retired 
from public observation to the shades of Capri. To the last, the em- 
perors of Constantinople lived in seclusion, governed the empire by 
proxy, and were to be approached only with difficulty, mystery and 
the most servile homage. * 

The exclusive relations thus established between the sacred mon- 
arch and the nobles or priests who surrounded his person, soon came 
to be repeated between those nobles and the rank next below them. 
For the same reason that the monarch dared only govern through 
his paladins, the paladins could not permit themselves to be ap- 
proached too closely by the people. Another barrier between the 
artificially exalted monarch and the artificially degraded people, an- 
other social rank, thus had to be formed; and so it went on, until the 
lowest substratum of the civil order was reached. This involution of 
rank, which included both the laity and clergy, was soon followed by 
an involution of political powers and obligations, which, being thus de- 
prived of all centripetal and centrifugal force, now only extended 
downward to the vassal, or upward from the vassal, through an in- 
volved succession of superiors, ending with the supernally exalted 
monarch. Such involution of rank, political powers and obligations, 
is peculiar to feudal systems. It is born of Sacred government, grows 
with its growth, weakens with its decay and disappears with its over- 
throw. ' 

' Suet. Aug., 72-76. 

* Julius Caesar introduced the kissing of the foot in Rome and wore a golden slipper 
for the ceremony. 

^ Suetonius in Galba 10, informs us that that prince surrounded himself with a privi- 
leged body of evocati. Anothername for privileged persons was beneficiarii. Evagrius, 
book II, chap, x, states that the Sacred emperor Leo (the Thracian) about A.D. 458, sent 
Diomedes, "the Silentiary," upon a mission to Timotheus, bishop of Alexandria. Here- 
upon his commentator explains that Silentiarii, ordomestici, or protectores, or cubicu- 
larii.were "officers of the highest honour about the emperor," that is to say, similar to 



82 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

Social arrangements of this character not only naturally result from 
an hierarchy, they never can be fully enforced or perpetuated without 
the aid of an hierarchy. Thus feudal subordination requires the as- 
sistance of sacred sovereignty, no less than sacred sovereignty needs 
the support of feudal subordination. These institutions are comple- 
mentary to each other, and where one is found the other is seldom 
far off. To look for either of them in a social system utterly desti- 
tute of the other, for example, to look for feudalism among the pagan 
Goths of Scandinavia, is a pursuit which can be attended with no profit- 
able result. No Gothic chieftain ever governed by proxy. 

At the very outset of the Roman imperial constitution, a tendency 
is to be observed toward the creation of an involved system of caste. 
The pagan ecclesiastical establishment, so far as its details can be 
gathered from the meagre evidences left to us, was already organized 
in this manner. The pontifex-maximus, the patrician flamines, of 
whom the flamen dialis was distinguished by a lictor and the right to 
enter the senate, the twelve palatini or patrician priests of Mars, the 
plebian flamines or minores, and the ministri, were thus related to 
each other. '" The ancient involved castes of patrician, plebian and 
freedman furnished the basis of this relation which distinguished the 
orders of imperial nobility. Both the ecclesiastical and temporal sys- 
tems of aristocracy were matured and developed by the Sacred con- 
stitution, whose Sacred emperor furnished the connecting link between 
them. Mr. Bryce notices the analogy between medieval priesthood 
and knighthood and very shrewdly suspects its source. Says that 
accomplished author: 

"Knighthood was constructed on the analogy of priesthood and 
knights were conceived as being to the world, in its secular aspect, 
exactly what priests, and more especially the monastic orders, were 
to it in its religious aspect; to the one body was given the sword of 
the flesh, to the other the sword of the spirit; each was universal, 
each had its aristocratic head. Singularly too, were these notions 
brought into harmony with the feudal polity. Csesar was Lord Para- 
mount of the world; its countries great fiefs, whose kings were his 

the evocati of Galba. They occupied in ,he palace an apartment next to the emperor's 
inmost chamber. The Silentiarii were so called by the reason of the silence they kept 
in reverence of the emperor. Beyond them, in a further apartment, was a lower rank 
of siientiaries, through whom it was necessary to approach the clarissimi or higher 
grade. "In this divine hierarchy (for such it is frequently styled) every rank was 
marked with the most scrupulous exactness and its dignity was displayed in a variety 
of trifling and solemn ceremonies which it was a study to learn and a sacrilege to 
neglect." Gibbon, ii, 24. 

'" Auctoratos, in tertia jura ministros. Manilius, v, 350. 



HIERARCHICAL ORIGIN OF FEUDALISM. 83 

tenants in chief, the suitors of his court, owing to him homage, fealty, 
and military service against the infidel." " 

The sovereign pontiff of Rome in his capacity of high-priest com- 
municated his instructions to the parish clergy or curates through the 
successive intermediation of the Sacred College, the legates, and local 
bishops. In a similar manner, in his capacity of emperor, he reached 
the citizens usually by expressing his wishes to the consuls, or the 
privy council, who communicated with the senate, who directed cer- 
tain equites or knights ** to make known the pleasure of the prince 
to the people. When these communications were addressed to the 
people of the provinces they passed through several other interme- 
diaries, the number of whose ranks always tended to increase and 
never to diminish. For example, Galba, in addition to the Twelve 
consuls, or councillors, or Counts of the Palace^ appointed a special 
and privileged corps of equites, evocati, or beneficiarii, to surround 
his person. '^ Constantine added many new ranks of nobility. When- 
ever a prince, like Nero, was too human to sustain the unnatural 
character of Sacred emperor and disregarded the super-imposed castes 
and social barriers which had been created to protect it, he brought 
the empire a step nearer to that dissolution which was its inevitable 
destiny. '* 

From the moment of the establishment of the Sacred empire oc- 
curred an exaltation of the superior orders, a relative degradation of 
the lower ones, and a continual addition of new intermediate grades 
to the social system. The patrician was drawn closer to the sover- 
eign and the plebian nearer to the slave. '^ Colquhoun, after a care- 
ful investigation of the laws that determined the status of the various 
social grades, declared that the plebian of the empire was hardly 
better off than the peasant of the medieval age; while Reitemeier 
states that in some districts or provinces of the empire the native in- 
habitants were doomed to a vassalage which enabled their persons to 
be bargained or conveyed away, together with the mines, to the no- 
bles who farmed the revenues of the latter. One is the opinion of a 

" " Holy Roman Empire," p. 251. 

^^ Previous to the establishment of the empire the equites were only distinguished 
by wealth and (generally) good birth, 

'^ See a previous note; also Die, XLV, 12. 

•* Sometimes the streams of proctorship intermingled, as when the pontifex-maximus 
communicated his decisions through the Sacred College, the Senate, and the civil mag- 
istrates; but the principle was the same; government by proxy. 

'^ So early as the reign of Tiberius, there were already three grades of counts. 
Selden, Titles of Honor, 296; Suet., in Tiberius. 



84 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

lawyer; the other of a miner. The history of the pagan College, from 
the sera of J^ilius Csesar to the beginning of the fourth century, has 
perished; but if we are to credit the intimations of Cyprian or the re- 
searches of Dupin or Mosheim, a similar movement marked the eccle- 
siastical orders of the empire. The change of religion had no effect 
upon it. Many of the early Christian presbyters were promoted to 
be bishops, and the bishops to be primates, who were to stand next 
in rank to the high-priest; whilst on the other hand and even before 
the time of Tertullian, the laicus was distinguished from the clericus 
and taught to duly venerate a profession, the humblest menber of 
which derived his official warrant from Heaven. Indeed the feudal 
system of caste, as well as of land tenures, is so interlaced with the 
Roman ecclesiastical organization, that, after both are regarded with 
attention, it will be found to be quite impracticable to describe them 
apart. The principle of vicarious control coloured them both alike. 

Hierarchies in a primitive state, which governed only a small or 
scattered population, may have existed in the absence of such a sys- 
tem of caste; but no important or populous hierarchies have been 
without one. At the outset, such systems were commonly sustained 
by the force of that superstition which permitted the creation of the 
hierarchy. As time advanced and the superstition declined, the caste 
system usually sought for other support, and found it in those mutual 
relations or obligations between approximate classes,which had sprung 
up in the meanwhile. These relations were the favour of church or 
palace, procured by the superior, and of service, performed by the 
inferior. As the former declined in value and the innumerable slaves 
of the empire were gradually liberated by the barbarian revolts, the 
caste system, though somewhat shaken, slowly but surely regained its 
footing, through those grants of ecclesiastical property which the 
church had made upon usufructuary tenures. 

In the remoter provinces, for example in Britain, the break in this 
system, that is to say, in Roman imperial government, lasted a longer 
time than in Italy, or the provinces near to it. This break or inter- 
val is to be measured from the termination of the pagan to the begin- 
ning of the christian hierarchy ; an interval that always increased with 
the distance from Rome. Feudalism existed in both hierarchies. No 
feudalism is to be perceived during the interregnum, where any in- 
terregnum occurred between them. It therefore seems difficult to 
avoid the conclusion that the essential cause of feudalism was hier- 
archical government ; that involved social castes and involved tenures 
of land were characteristics of feudalism, due to its hierarchical ori- 



HIERARCHICAL ORIGIN OF FEUDALISM. 85 

gin ; and that the accidental or extrinsic forms of the already involved 
land tenures, so much dwelt upon by writers on feudalism, are attri- 
butable merely to the peculiar circumstances and social relations of 
ancient Rome, out of which they sprang. 

The lands of the church, or ecclesiastical organization, were not 
alienated by grants conveying absolute or allodial tenures.'^ They 
belonged to that Lord of Heaven who was ready to receive uncon- 
ditionally, but never to unconditionally grant. Such lands could not 
be sold. Mortmain held them; they were inalienable; their usufruct 
alone was negotiable; the grant or conveyance of such usufruct con- 
stituted a benefice or fief; and in after times, when this was paid 
for with the services of freedmen, instead of money, it was called a 
feud." 

Originally, beneficiaries — beneficiarii — far from being bound to 
military service, were especially those who were exempt from it, or 
from some feature of it ; and who had obtained this benefit or favour, 
by privilege, indulgence or purchase.'* During its three or four cen- 
turies of constantly declining vitality, the pagan imperial church was 
usually the framer and always the custodian, of wills and testaments. 
Many pious or priest-ridden pagans appointed the pontifex-maximus 
their soul heir, or, together with their children, the joint heir, of all 
their possessions. In the reign of Augustus some dying persons pro- 
vided by will that an offering should be made to the church in grati- 
tude for the signal favour that the Son of God, as they esteemed their 
emperor, had appeared on earth during their own lifetime.'^ From 
these and other superstitious sources the pagan church acquired im- 
mense landed estates in every part of the empire. These estates were 
worked by slaves; who by reason of their civil condition and the 
service in which they were employed (both priests and slaves being 
alike privileged) were exempt from military service.'"* 

The attempt which Gratian made to confiscate this vast possession 

'® Higgins, while hunting for a solution of the feudal system, made a curious stumble; 
but in truth his intellectual power here seems to have failed him; and he died before 
this part of his work was printed. 

" Muratori, cited in Robertson's Charles V., i, 225. Note H, sec. iv. 

'8 Festus, Caes., B. C. I, 75; Tacitus, Annals, i, 17; Hist., I, 46; Pliny, Ep., X, 32. 

'^Ferguson's Roman Republic, v, 133. From Suetonius. 

^° In his chap, xxvi (vol. 11, p. 593,) Gibbon, writing of the reign of Valens, alludes 
to the " immense sums of gold supplied by the provincials, to compensate their annual 
proportion of recruits." When such military service was demanded by provincial no- 
bles and made the condition of holding lands, it was evidently of feudal character. 
Such a noble was Maximus, who was then duke (dux) of Thrace. 



86 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

cost him his throne and life.^' Theodosius was more successful. In 
vain did Symmachus protest that the estates which had been sacredly- 
devoted to the temples, the vestal virgins, and the ofificers of relig- 
ion, were now "withheld by the Treasury." The Senate had received 
its instructions; and when it formally adopted Christianity as the 
religion of the empire, and by virtue of this legislation, the pagan 
hierarchy was instantly superceded by a christian hierarchy, the latter 
became the lawful heir to the possessions, livings, and revenues, of 
the former. Instead of being steeped in poverty, as some have sup- 
posed, the christian church, when it began its official career, was the 
owner de jure of probably one half of the lands and one fourth 
the entire population of the Roman empire. No wonder that, as Dr. 
Taylor intimated" the pagan priests followed the livings and reve- 
nues, and declared themselves christians, that they might continue 
to enjoy them. 

Nor did this vast wealth diminish with time. Said Chilperic some 
two centuries later: " Our exchequer is impoverished, and all our 
riches are transferred to the clergy; none reign now but the bishops, 
who live in grandeur; while we are quite eclipsed." Charles Martel 
found all the landed estates of the kingdom in the hands of the clergy. 
They had even acquired "a great part of the allodial estates." To 
remedy this, he proceeded at first to strip the altars and release the 
estates; afterwards he made a friendly compact with Pope Gregory 
III., thus verifying Chilperic's maxim about the monks: "Crows do 
not pluck out each other's eyes." " Pepin, unable to get back for the 
church all the property confiscated by Martel, issued precaria. They 
had previously been issued by Obroin, Mayor of the Palace. In this 
manner the new monarch loaded the church with benefits. " So great 
were the donations made to the clergy that under the three races of 
our kings they must have received the full value of all the lands of 
the kingdom several times over." This avidity of the church was a 
continual source of dissension between the temporal and ecclesiasti- 
cal powers/* 

It was the desire of exemption from military service and ecclesias- 
tical vassalage, on the part of the provincial population, rather than 

*' Nero had previously sacked the churches at Rome to rebuild the city after the 
g^eat fire. Tacitus Annals, xv. 45. Diocletian and his imperial coadjutors (except 
Constantine Chlorus) demolished the now so-called christian and other heretical tem- 
ples, sold their properties at public auction and covered the proceeds into the imperial 
fisc. Gibbon, chap. xvi. ^^ Diegesis, 147. 

** Gregory of Tours, vi, 46. "^ Montesquieu, (London ed.), 11, 339, 340, 342. 



HIERARCHICAL ORIGIN OF FEUDALISM. 87 

any rage for lands on the part of the Goths, which resulted in the 
disloyal coalitions and revolts that have been erroneously regarded as 
a Barbarian Invasion. The right of choice between the hastily con- 
structed barbarian laws and the mature Jus Romanum proves the 
coalitions,^^ while the acceptance of christian hierarchical castes and 
titles by the barbarous Gothic chieftains who had rebelled against im- 
perial investiture, proves that no conquest took place; for how can 
that be regarded a conquest in which the victors became the vassals 
of the vanquished? 

Although the church was gradually induced to emancipate its rebel- 
lious slaves, it always held on to the title of its lands. Its usufructuary 
grants of these lands — employed as bribes to sustain its popularity or 
to satisfy the demands of vassals preferring to wear its yoke rather 
than submit to imperial investiture — were called benefices. The es- 
tates thus granted were known as fiefs. If they acquired this name, 
as some have contended, from the Latin word fides, meaning faith- 
fulness or fidelity, ^^ it is quite as likely to have meant fidelity in 
religion as in war. The holders of ecclesiastical lands, to which many 
allusions are made in the Lombard and other barbarian codes, paid 
for their use, not with military services, but with produce or money. "'' 
Their military services were due to the Gothic chieftain, by whose 
assistance they had been emancipated from ecclesiastical or other 
slavery. Thus Chilperic, king of Soissons, exacted a fine, bannos 
jussit exigi, from certain vassals who had neglected or refused him 
military service. Childebert II. , king of Austrasia and Orleans, levied 
similar fines for a similar refusal. ^^ These vassals could hardly have 
been unromanised Franks, because this class served their chiefs vol- 
untarily and for the sake of glory, plunder, or revenge. They prob- 
ably belonged to the class of Roman freedmen, who were willing to 
pay allegiance and tribute to the church, so long as they could choose 
their own priests. 

If it be doubted that the possessions of the church were vast enough 
and its usufructuary grants numerous enough to create a system of 
land tenures which prevailed for many centuries, it is only necessary 
to briefly recall the circumstances of its growth. During the Com- 
monwealth the priests served for glory and without pay; the expenses 
of the ecclesiastical system were very slight; and they were met by 
the sacred share of the spoils of war, by voluntary contributions, or 
else by a portion of the ordinary revenues of the state. The worship 

" Robertson, i, 314. ^* Cicero, De Off., i, S. 

^'' Du Cange, voc. Beneficium. '^^ Gregory of Tours. 



88 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

of Julius and Augustus added a vast number of new temples, shrines, 
sanctuaries, monasteries, and religious houses to those which pre- 
viously existed. '' Before Gratian commenced his work of religious 
reformation there were in the city of Rome alone no less than four 
hundred and twenty-four pagan temples or chapels. ^° All these 
temples necessarily possessed lands, and these in the midst of so rich 
a city must have been exceedingly valuable. A similar multiplication 
of religious temples occurred in all parts of the empire. A common 
mode of propitiating the deified emperor was to erect a temple con- 
secrated to his worship. " The number of religious rites, ceremonies, 
and festivals was also greatly increased, and these required a vast 
addition of prelates, priests, and clerks, whose numbers, owing to 
their exemption from military service, never failed to overflow the 
bounds of requirement. Neither the offerings of the pious, nor the 
sacred share of the spoils of war, were any longer competent to meet 
the cost of such a gigantic establishment. Many patricians and wealthy 
citizens, disgusted with the worship of Julius and Augustus, or fear- 
ing persecution under the lex crimen majestatis, withdrew to secluded 
places, where there were neither temples nor deified emperors. In 
this manner the church lost a portion of the offerings which it had 
been accustomed to receive from this class There were no more 
kingdoms to conquer; the temple of Janus was thrice closed by Au- 
gustus; the spoils of war greatly declined; and the sacred share had 
dwindled to almost nothing. 

"^^ During the Commonwealth the priesthood got little or no emolument and served 
the public "for the bare honour of their dignities." Nor were they exempt from mili- 
tary service. After the subversion of the Commonwealth and erection of the hierarchy, 
Augustus and Tiberius "were forced to settle large appointments upon the clergy, ut 
dignatio sacerdotibus acciderat, to give authority and reputation to the order." Moyle, 
I, 39, 49, citing Suet, in Aug. 31 and Tac, iv, 17; Livy, iv; 59, and Dionys., p. 66. 
Moreover, they obtained the privilege of military exemption — beneficio. During the 
Commonwealth the magistrates took especial care to prevent religion or superstition 
from becoming a source of profit to priests or diviners; gifts or bequests to the clergy 
were forbidden or regulated; and those who sought to evade these restrictions were 
known by the opprobrious name of eeruscatores (swindlers). Moyle, I, 40, citing Cicero 
de Legg., 11, 19; Livy, iv, 30; xxv. i; Ovid de Pont. ,11; Aul. Gel., xiv., i; Phaed., 3; 
and Fab., 20. After the subversion of the Commonwealth these restrictions were re- 
moved, with the result that the land and territories of the people became rapidly 
absorbed by the priesthood (consecrated to the gods), after which they could not be 
alienated. Diod. Sic, p. 425. ^"Gibbon, in, 72. 

^' Nero had a daughter by Poppaea. This infant died at the age of four months; 
" she was canonized for a goddess, a temple was decreed to her with an altar, a bed 
of state, a priest, and religious ceremonies." Tacitus, Annals, xv, 23. 



HIERARCHICAL ORIGIN OF FEUDALISM. 89 

To make good these deficiencies it was natural that the sovereign- 
pontiff should seize every opportunity to endow the church with 
conquered lands, abandoned and confiscated properties, and the pos- 
sessions of intestates. The agency of the hierarchy in the preparation 
and preservation of wills, also afforded it opportunities to influence 
the granting of legacies by private persons for the support of religion. 
Bequests to the church in gratitude for the favour of the testator's 
having breathed the same air as the divine Augustus, have already 
been cited, and when it is remembered that even after the light of 
the gospel was thrown upon the darkness and superstition of these 
ages, men voluntarily enslaved themselves to churches, and, to save 
their souls, degraded their persons to the ranks of sensuales or min- 
isteriales, it cannot be doubted that bequests of lands and slaves to 
the pagan church, were common." In these and in other ways the 
occasional tithes of war were supplanted by the regular tithes of 
superstition, and these, augmenting during four centuries of time, 
could hardly have resulted else than in making the pagan church the 
wealthy proprietor described. Montesquieu's array of evidence on 
this subject must be regarded as conclusive. 

That the feudal system of Europe was of Roman hierarchical origin 
is thus proved by the invariable connection found to exist in coun- 
tries outside of Europe between hierarchical governments and feudal 
systems; by the synchronism of their rise and fall, as illustrated in 
Japan; by the reason of their connection, which is due to the neces- 
sity of artificially axalting the sacred monarch, a proceeding which 
results in government by proxy and in the creation of an involved 
system of caste; finally, it is proved by the usufructuary grants of 
ecclesiastical property. 

No such system as this, no government by proxy, no feudal system, 
existed among any of the barbarous tribes who are credited with the 
destruction of the Roman empire; it was foreign to the simplicity of 
their social organisation; it did not fit their wandering life; it could 
neither have been established or maintained without the assistance 
of that art of writing, of which, until after the period of their imag- 
inary conquest of the Roman empire, they appear to have been sub- 

^^ The oblati placed themselves and their effects under the protection of a particular 
temple or monastery, binding themselves to defend its privileges and property against 
all comers; the censuales paid an annual quit-rent out of their estates to a temple or 
monastery, and, besides this, bound themselves to perform certain services in return 
for its protection; the ministeriales became absolute slaves "in the strict and proper 
sense of the word." Robertson, Note xx; Potgiesserus, de statu servorum; Du Cange, 
voc. Oblatus, etc. 



90 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

stantially ignorant. Long before the barbarians compiled those codes 
of law in which marks of the feudal system have been observed, long 
before the barbarians had practically mastered the art of writing, and 
in some instances, before they had any existence at all as separate 
communities, the elements of feudalism had been established within 
the Roman hierarchy, awaiting only the effects of time to mature 
them into a complete system. 

The characteristics by which feudalism is to be distinguished from 
any other social system are now before us. These are hierarchical 
government; vicarious control and vicarious allegiance; involved 
arrangements of temporal and ecclesiastical castes; involved tenures 
of land; inalienable property; and usufructuary grants. The first two 
marks attend feudalism from the outset; the others grow out of them, 
and become attached to it as the system matures. After the affairs 
of an empire are caste into new forms and relations by the establish- 
ment of an hierarchy, every incident of social life, though previously 
free from feudal taint, assumes a feudal form. In other words, feudal- 
ism breeds feudalism, and continues to breed it, until the hierar- 
chical cause is removed. Feudal marks are therefore endless; and as 
they belong to various ages of the system and derive local colour 
from local peculiarities, their employment as criteria is often per- 
plexing and misleading. The mark of vicarious control and allegiance 
is however a tolerably sure guide in all cases. It begins at the begin- 
ning and does not disappear even when the system is destroyed; but 
survives for ages in forms and customs that convey no suspicion of 
their remote and impious origin." 

It is because the mark of vicarious government is found in the 
Judean charters and not on account of the presence or absence of 
provisions for military service, that we have ventured to regard them 
as feudal. The kingdom which Herod held of Caesar was granted by 
the Roman emperor for the same reason and substantially upon the 
same terms that Charlemagne afterwards granted a government to 
John of Pontes: "In order that the said John and his descendants 
may enjoy it without trouble or rent so long as they remain faithful 
to our crown." Fidelity to the crown here implies military service. 
In the case of Herod such service was actually accorded, and when 
the Herodian princess of Judea sought the favour of the reigning em- 
peror of Rome, they never forgot to remind him that Antipater had 
furnished one thousand five hundred troops to the deified Julius during 

^^ The title by which a British chieftain was permitted to rule the Regni, namely, 
I.egatus Augusti, implies a feudal tenure. 



HIERARCHICAL ORIGIN OF FEUDALISM. 9I 

■his campaign in Egypt and that they remained in a similar manner 
amenable to the requirements of the crown.** 

Yet it was not this military service that made a fief of Judea, any 
more than it was military service which proves the feudal fief of 
Fontarabia. The proconsuls of Rome governed provinces larger and 
more populous than Judea, or Fontarabia; they were appointed at 
Rome; their powers included the levy and command of the legions 
and the administration of justice, imperium et potestatem, as well as 
the collection and disposal of the revenues : they were obliged to furnish 
such military service as the government at Rome required. Whatever 
they might have become after the accession of Julius Csesar, no one 
pretends that before that event the proconsuls were feudal officers, 
or that the Roman provinces were feudal fiefs. 

What mark is it then that distinguishes Herod's charter from that 
of a proconsul under the Commonwealth? The mark of vicarious 
government. In the case of Herod the military service or tribute 
reserved by and due to Caesar was not owing by the inhabitants of 
Judea, but by Herod. The fidelity, or military service, reserved by 
Charlemagne and the rent which he renounced, were not owing by 
the inhabitants of the Spanish March, but by John of Fontes. Herod 
was a king by favour — benefice — of Caesar: John was a marquis by 
favour of Charlemagne. This is proved by the necessity mentioned 
in both cases, of their having to obtain confirmation or renewal of 
their charters. Herod and his successors were obliged periodically 
to obtain a renewal of their kingship; John and his successors were 
compelled to obtain similar confirmations of their marquisate. This 
ceremony was intended in both cases to remind the incumbent that 
his paramountship was incomplete, that he was merely an agent 
or vicar of the supreme sovereign, and that he must pay a relief upon 
each renewal of his vicarship. In both cases the government of the 
people was vicarious. In the first case Caesar governed Herod, and 
Herod governed the Jews; in the second, Charlemagne governed 
John and John governed the Fontarabians. After the granting of 
Herod's charter, Csesar had no more legal right to enact laws or levy 
troops in Judea, than Charlemagne in Fontarabia. 

The proconsular governments of the previous period were con- 
ducted upon a far different theory. The provincial law was the same 
as the law of Rome; and even when modified by the proconsul, to 
meet local requirements, the modification was made conformably to 
Roman law. The proconsul was an officer of that law; he could be 

^* See Appendix B. 



92 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

impeached, degraded, or recalled at pleasure of the Senate; the powers 
which he exercised, whether military, judicial or fiscal, were exercised 
for and by the Roman government, which had the right, at any 
moment, to modify them or take them back into its own hands. 

Under the empire, the proconsul gradually became a feudal mon- 
arch, he appointed a privy council, consilium, he created contuber- 
nales or counts and other (lower) orders of nobility. Under a Julian 
law, coeval with the very origin of the empire, the proconsuls laid 
military or other charges upon cities or lands. '^ The navicularii per- 
formed services which descended to their sons and heirs, and enjoyed 
estates and privileges in return.'^ These are clearly feudal services 
and feudal marks. Under the Commonwealth the government of 
Rome had nothing vicarious about it, and always sought to be in 
touch with the people, whether of Italy or the provinces. Republican 
proconsular government grew out of the vast extension of the empire 
and the impracacability of governing it from a single capital. Feudal 
proconsular government grew out of that Sacred constitution which 
placed the emperor so far above the people, that he could only gov- 
ern them vicariously." 

Reluctant to admit the validity of the proofs herein advanced in 
favour of the Roman origin of the feudal system, there are some 
writers who persist in repeating that no system of government could 
have outlived the destruction occasioned by the Barbarian Conquest 
of the empire, and that therefore the feudal system ot the medieval 
age must have been of later or barbarian origin.^* This kind of logic 
would make the Civil Law itself a product of barbarism. The reply 
to it is that, in the sense of overthrow or destruction of the Roman 
empire, there was no Barbarian Conquest. Except Attila, the Hun, 
there was no destroyer among the barbarians. On the contrary, they 
conserved all they could; institutions, government, laws, temples, 
arts, and even titles and ceremonies.'* Clovis exulted in his Roman 
proconsulship; his son Theodoret received Provence, which the 
monks inform us was the fruit of his battle-axe, as the gift of Jus- 
tinian; Sigismund, the Burgundian king, who was created a Patrician 
and Count by Anastasius, professed the deepest gratitude and strong- 

^* Cicero, Att., v, i6, 21. 

^^ Code Theod.,and Commentary of Valesius appended to Evagrius, bk., 11, chap. 9. 

*' In another place it is shown that as the feudal system matured, another grade of 
nobles was created between the Roman court and the proconsuls. These powerful 
ofiScers were known by the title of pranorian prcefects. 

** " The Drama of Empire," by W. Marsham Adams, B. A., London, 1891, p. 128. 

^* Lanciani's " x\ncient Rome." 



HIERARCHICAL ORIGIN OF FEUDALISM. 93 

est fidelity to that Eastern court, which, we are informed, was pow- 
erless either to help or hurt him. Said Sigismund, writing to Anas- 
tasius, by the hand of the bishop Avitus ; ' ' My people are yours, and 
to rule them delights me less than to serve you. The hereditary de- 
votion of my race to Rome has made us account those the highest 
rewards which your honorary titles convey. We have always preferred 
what an emperor gave, to what our ancestors could bequeath. In 
ruling our people we hold ourselves only your legates. You, whose 
Divinely appointed empire no barrier bounds, whose light radiates 
from the Orient to distant Gaul, employ us to administer in your 
name the remoter regions of the Empire. Our fatherland belongs to 
your World."" Said Athaulf, the Visigoth, brother-in-law to Alaric: 
" It was at first my wish to destroy the Roman name and erect in its 
place a Gothic empire, taking to myself the rank and authority of 
Caesar Augustus. But when experience taught me that the untamea- 
ble barbarism of the Goths would not suffer them to live beneath the 
sway of law and that the abolition of the institutions on which the 
state rested would involve the ruin of the state itself, I preferred 
the glory of renewing and maintaining by Gothic strength the gov- 
ernment of Rome, desiring to go down to posterity as the restorer 
of the Roman authority, which it was beyond my power to replace. " "' 
These few words are like a phonographic message from the men 
whose motives and principles we are discussing. They are more val- 
uable than a thousand volumes of windy commentary. After their 
emphatic testimony it seems unnecessary to adduce any further evi- 
dence on the subject. However, if any be wanting, it will be found 
in the titles assumed, the powers and prerogatives exercised, and the 
authority and rights universally conceeded, during the middle ages, to 
both the Roman state and the Roman church. The conquest and 
destruction of the empire by the barbarians is a tale which was in- 
vented by the monks to account for the ignorance and mischief which 
their pagan predecessors, in the church, themselves had brought about. 
When the Chinese-pilgrims viewed the ruins of those Indian cities 
which had been overthrown in the religious wars incited by the Bramo- 
Buddhist monks, the latter charged the mischief to those wicked peo- 
ple, the barbarians. Such is human nature. It is always somebody 
else that did it; and the somebody else of the Roman monks, was the 
barbarians." 

*"Bryce, 18. The original is printed in Migne's " Patrologia," vol. Lix, p. 285. 

^' Orosius, VII, 43. 

*" Numerous and overwhelming evidences that the Goths spared, and the monks 



94 THE IMIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

That the feudal system was the product of the hierarchy finds ad- 
ditional confirmation in the fact that whenever the supremacy of 
that hierarchy was interrupted, the feudal system began to die away; 
and contrariwise, whenever the power of the hierarchy was restored, 
the feudal system revived. Thus, when the see of Roman revolted 
from the Sacred empire and combined with Pepin to form the Medie- 
val empire, the hierarchy, so far as Western Europe is concerned, was 
temporarily suspended. The empire of Charlemagne, as its emblem 
indicates, had two heads, not one. The superior and governing head 
was Charlemagne; the inferior and governed head was the Pope. 
During the reign of Charlemagne feudalism everywhere commenced 
to give way; but no sooner did the church regain its ascendancy and 
restore hierarchical government to the west, than feudalism took a 
new lease of life. Indeed it alternately flourished and faded, as its 
hierarchical source of life shone out in splendour, or underwent 
eclipse. 

The Roman hierarchy not only split the empire into pieces, it de- 
tached itself, by seceding, from the emperor. It was always the 
ecclesiastical interest and endeavor to keep apart those political 
fragments which the pontificate had separated, but the emperor might 
reunite. This policy it promoted by actively supporting feudalism." 
The feudal system was entirely opposed to the customs an.inclina- 
tions of the Gothic race; it was unsuitedto its freshness, its strength, 
its virility, its tendency to increase in numbers, and to its coarseness 
of thought and language. Nor did feudalism harmonise any better 
with the physical circumstances of the continent, than it did with the 
temper of the barbarians. Europe was comparatively new: its lands 
were scarcely cleared ; its resources were substantially undeveloped ; it 
contained scarcely forty millions of people, whereas to-day it easily 
supports ten times this number. What it needed, to encourage growth, 
was unity and peace. After the reformation of the sixteenth century, 
when such unity and peace became possible, Europe soared at once 

long afterwards destroyed, the temples, statues, and other works of Roman art and 
religion, will be found in the reluctant pages of Lanciani. 

*^ If the Church ever mistook its friends for its enemies it was during the disturbed 
period which followed the death of Charlemagne and in which it found itself face to 
face with the strange institutes established by that eccentric monarch. In this novel 
situation, wholly without precedent, the Church, instead of seeking support from the 
feudal lords, made the mistake, not of condemning, but rather of leaning against, 
some of the features of a system, which in fact was of its own creation and without 
whose support it could not hope to maintain its supremacy. But it had the sagacity 
to soon perceive its blunder and reform its policy. 



HIERARCHICAL ORIGIN OF FEUDALISM. 95 

from ignorance to invention, and from indigence to wealth. But such 
unity and peace did not suit the interests of the sort of ecclesiasticism 
that governed the dark ages. The policy of that period was feudal 
separation and private war. The church was quite conscious that the 
unity of kingdoms meant its own downfall. Accordingly it exerted 
all its powers to prevent such unity and to foment intestine wars." 
There is scarcely a quarrel of the dark and medieval ages that can- 
not be traced to the machinations of the clergy, who derived a profit 
both from the spoils of war, from the negotiation of truces, which 
their address and knowledge of letters enabled them to monopolise, 
and from the dissensions of hundreds of petty and jealous states. 

The means adopted to destroy an edifice sometimes afford a clue 
to its origin, proportions, and character. When the Roman hierarch- 
ical government came to an end, what were the measures employed 
to destroy that edifice of feudalism which it had erected and propped 
up so long? Was it the abolition of Mr. Hallam's land tennures based 
upon military services? Not at all. It was the termination of vica- 
rious government; it was the curtailment of intermediate relations 
between the sovereign and the people. Long after feudalism was 
substantially dead, the military tenures and castles survived; though 
now bereft of all political use and soon doomed to be engulfed in the 
ruins of the mighty social structure of which at no time did they form 
more than an incidental or insignificant landmark. 

Before we take a final leave of the subject of feudalism, it is nec- 
essary to justify an opinion which has been more than once brought 
forward in this connection. This is that some of the extrinsic forms 
or marks of Roman feudalism, as distinct from other feudal systems, 
were due to certain peculiar institutions or the peculiar form of cer- 
tain institutions, of antefeudal, or scarcely yet feudal, Rome. 

Among the most ancient of these was the obligation of every ple- 
bian to choose a patron from among the patricians. The relations of 
patron and client were reciprocal, their duties mutual; even cities 
and nations were under the protection of noble families; as the Sicil- 
ians under the Marcelli, Cyprus and Cappadocia under Cato's family, 
the Allobroges under the Fabii, the Bononienses under the Antonii, 
Lacedsemon under the Claudii, the Puteolians under Cassius, the 
Capuans under Cicero, etc. The principle of this system is to be ob- 
served in the constitution of the Medieval empire. In 858 the bish- 
ops wrote to Louis II., of Germany: "We bishops, sacred to the 
Lord, are not, like the laity, obliged to attach ourselves to any patron. "** 
*'' See Appendix E. *^ Guizot, iii, 36. 



96 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

When, upon this very ancient foundation of patrician and plebian, 
or patron and client, there was erected the superstructure of an hier- 
archy, the feudal edifice was almost complete. To the two ranks of 
Roman citizens which this system supplied and to the tribunes and 
equites of a later origin, were now added the various orders of ec- 
clesiastical aristocracy, capped by a divinity whose tremendous power 
could easily regulate their various claims to precedence and social 
rank. These claims naturally adjusted themselves to the demands of 
that vicarious form of government which flowed from the sacerdotal 
character of the emperor. Hence followed that involved system and 
those numerous orders of nobility which distinguished feudalism. 

The ancient systems of land-grants and slavery, furnished, in a 
similar manner, the foundations of feudal military vassalage. In 
granting conquered lands to its citizens, the Roman government had 
naturally bound the grantees to provide for the subsistence of the 
indigenous population " and resolved the right to enlist the latter in 
the army. Thus Tacitus relates*^ of the Thracians (A. D. 26) that 
"they saw the flower of their youth carried off to recruit the Roman 
armies." When under the influence of vicarious government the 
Roman grantees of lands became feudal lords, and the government, 
instead of dealing directly with the peasantry, dealt with them through 
these lords, the latter were obliged to exact from the peasantry the 
same conditions of military service to which they themselves had 
been subjected by the government, under the penalty of forfeiting 
their estates. 

Under the Commonwealth, vast numbers of slaves were held by 
Roman partricians upon distant estates. That these slaves (chiefly 
captives) gained the good will of their masters, seems to follow from 
the fact that at that period, they were usually permitted to bear their 
given names. The masters, on the other hand, found it their interest 
to grant them easy terms of emancipation, such as those of remaining 
upon the soil as tributaries. Cicero informs us that in his time few 
sober and industrious slaves of the captive class, remained such be- 
yond a term of about six years, which time appears to have been 
sufficient to enable them to work out their freedom in the manner 
described. The danger of servile insurrections and the safety of the 

*^ A similar provision, doubtless copied from some ancient law, occurs in the capitu- 
lary of A.D. 794: " Whoever holds a benefice from us must take care that none of the 
slaves die of hunger and must not sell the crops until he has provided for the subsist- 
ence of such slaves." Baluze, torn., i, col. 264; Guizot, iii, 29. 

*' Annals, iv, 46. 



HIERARCHICAL ORIGIN OF FEUDALISM. 97 

republic promoted that policy of the patricians, which induced them 
to bind such freed slaves to the soil, as in Russia at the present, or 
at a very recent day. 

When under the empire the necessities of the government com- 
pelled it to call upon these patricians for troops, the latter were 
obliged to commute the tribute or produce, due to them as rent, and 
accept, in place of it, the military service of their tenantry; and this 
exchange, the latter were glad to make, because it promised promo- 
tion, pay and spoil, while on active service, and social freedom, after- 
wards. Such appears to have been the origin of that military vassal- 
age which has been so strangely mistaken for the whole feudal system. 

Emphyteusis — or that tenure of land which requires the tenant not 
only to pay rent for the estate but also to continually improve it, 
failing which double obligation, it shall revert to the original owner — 
was adopted by the Commonwealth with respect to its public lands 
about B. C. 146. At this period Greece was a Roman province, the 
third Punic war was ended, Carthage was destroyed, and Rome was 
troubled with agrarian agitation. In the course of a single genera- 
tion this tenure was introduced into the various provinces of the 
republic; Italy, Carthage, Spain and Syria, as well as Greece. All 
tenures short of complete ownership have been found to weaken the 
peasant's incentive to improve the land, but not so efficaciously as 
this one; which nevertheless was designed especially to promote such 
improvement."® However, it is not to this feature of emphyteusis but 
to its easy descent into a feudal form, that attention is here invited. 
There are many circumstances, such as bad crops, absence, illness, 
or death, under which continual improvement becomes impracticable, 
and the temptation to exchange an uncertain, for a certain, tenure, 
even though the latter be burthened with services as well as rent, 
becomes irresistible. The disappearance of Roman emphyteutical 
tenures in Gaul, which was conquered a century later than Greece, 
bespeaks such an exchange of tenures in that province. The circum- 
stances indicate that emphyteusis was carried by the Romans into 
that province — as it had been into all their other provinces — where 
it was afterwards, that is to say, before the time of Clovis, exchanged 
for feudal tenures. There are evidences of its having lingered in 
some parts of the province so late as the sera of Charlemagne.*' 

*^ This subject has been treated at some length by the author, in his Essay on " Portu- 
gal," Lippincott's Magazine, 1872. 

*^Capit., A.D. 813; Bal. t., i, col. 507; Guizot, ill, 29. Another feudal feature, 
the right of heriot, may also be traced to the declining days of the Commonwealth. 



g8 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

Briefly as it has been attempted to treat the subject of feudalism, 
it already occupies more space in this volume than can well be spared 
for the purpose; but as it is chiefly upon this system of government 
and the artificial relations which it maintained between the empire 
and the provinces or kingdoms of the Middle Ages that the entire 
history of the latter turns, it has been deemed better in this instance 
to lean toward amplification, than to risk obscurity. 

It must be remembered that the first article of the Sacred consti- 
tution of the Roman empire was the deification and worship of Julius 
the Father, and Augustus the Son, and that this impious article was 
observed with more or less fidelity by the Roman world until it was 
undermined by the introduction of the christian faith. The second 
article was feudalism, or vicarious government, and an involved sys- 
tem of caste or estates. The principal remaining articles will be briefly 
dealt with in the next chapter. 

" As priests, the patricians exercised other vexations over the people. . . . Under 
pretext of sacrifices, they took the finest ram, the best bull, from the plebian." 
Michelet, Hist. Rome, p. loi. 



99 



CHAPTER VI. 

FIRST INSTITUTES OF THE SACERDOTAL EMPIRE, 

Informality of the Constitution — After the deification of the emperor and the re- 
sulting feudalization of the government, its principal institutes were as follows : The 
Sacred College and Pontifex-Maximus — Monachism — Cononization — Sanctuaries — 
Sacred Scriptures — Succession to the throne — Infallibility of the sovereign-pontiff — 
Crimen majestatis — Inquisition — Excommunication — Legislature — Judicial system — 
Education. 

THOUGH the Romans never possessed a formal Constitution, yet 
during tlie Commonwealth such was the simplicity and direct- 
ness of the government, such the explicitness of its institutes, such 
the publicity given to its affairs, that to describe the constitution of 
that period would be a comparatively easy matter. On the contrary, 
to depict, ever so rudely, the constitution of the Hierarchy, is a task 
Ipeset with the greatest difficulties. First, because the organic law flowed 
^rom the acts of the sovereign-pontiff, many of which acts, though 
apparently of a secular character, really emanated from the Sacred 
college of which he was the head, and were made to fit the preexist- 
ing laws and traditions of that organization. Some of these originated 
in Etruria, others in Greece, Cimmeria, Media, Assyria or Egypt, and 
are not fully known to us. Second, because under the influence of 
an hierarchy and of that ever increasing tendency to govern vicari- 
ously, which is inseparable from an hierarchy, the operation of the 
law continually changed, and therefore it cannot be correctly de- 
scribed in reference to any considerable period of time. Third, be- 
cause notwithstanding their sacerdotal origin the acts of the imperial 
government were modified by the usages, customs and opinions of 
the many barbarous nations which Rome had conquered and now in- 
cluded within her boundaries. Lastly, in respect of those exceptional 
acts of government which did not proceed either from the Sacred 
college or the Common law, they were of so personal, arbitrary and 
despotic a character as to be incapable of reduction to rule or insti- 
tution. 

Yet it is upon these personal actions, these whims, caprices, and 
eccentricities, of often merely ephemeral sovereigns, that history has 



lOO THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

hitherto been grounded; the pagan canon law and common law being 
left entirely out of view. In relating the annals of the hierarchy, Tacitus 
said: " The constitution had long been annihilated, the functions of 
the magistrates were wrested out of their hands, the will of the prince 
was the law;"* and this, coupled with the false assumption that the 
empire had a secular constitution — a constitution apart from the 
church — has been the keynote of all subsequent historical writings. 
But the empire had no such constitution. It was an hierarchy from 
the day when Julius Caesar was deified in the Serapion, nay almost 
from the period of his long proconsulship of Gaul, from whose Druid 
sages he learnt the potency, without perceiving the defects, of a 
priestly rule. The constitution regretted by Tacitus is the same one 
that was deplored by Cicero, who forfeited, in a vain attempt to re- 
store it, what would have been the crowning years of a brilliant life: 
it was the constitution of the Commonwealth. 

Nor was the constitution of the hierarchy an absolute despotism. 
Cicero in one place clearly points out the fact that as C^sar ruled 
the state, so was Csesar in turn ruled by the circumstances of the 
state, and in another, he indicates the nature of some of these cir- 
cumstances, for he says'' that the state was obliged to obey not only 
the will of the conqueror but " the will also of those who helped him 
to power," chief amongst whom were the permanent priesthood, the 
new aristocracy and the soldiery. Tacitus also admits of Tiberius 
that "the prince knew the public eye was upon him and resolved, for 
that reason, to wait. " There was therefore a public opinion to restrain 
that "will of the prince which was the law " and such public opinion in 
turn largely rested upon the ancient laws and customs and upon none 
of them so solidly and securely as upon the laws of religion, the 
Sibylline books, the traditions of the Sacred college, the laws of au- 
gury, the sacred rites and privileges of the priesthood — in short the 
pagan canon law. 

In attempting to delineate the institutes of the hierarchy, we are 
therefore attempting a difficulty, not an impossibility. There was an 
organic law, not merely a lex non scripta, but also a lex scripta, and 
although this law has been lost or destroyed, it has left such a deep 
imprint upon the history of mankind that it is still possible to re- 
cover, if not its outlines, yet something of its spirit, tendency and 
operation. 

The deification and worship of the sovereign-pontiff and the sys- 

• Annals, xi, 5. ' Letters, iv, 141. 



FIRST INSTITUTES OF THE SACERDOTAL EMPIRE. lOI 

tern of inalienable estates granted by the hierarchy, in its character 
of emperor, to the hierarchy in its character of pontiff, have already 
formed the subject of separate chapters. The other principal articles 
of the Sacred constitution maybe conveniently considered under the 
several heads mentioned in the summaries placed at the beginning of 
this and the chapter following. The minor articles of the constitu- 
tion are not essential to the present work. For the sake of conven- 
ience, the date of the Sacred constitution has been assumed to coin- 
cide with the advent of Augustus A. U. 713, though in point of fact, 
the hierarchy originated with Julius Csesar and continued in process 
of formation during his reign and that of Augustus, and indeed for 
some time afterwards. 

The Sacred College and Pontifex Maximus. — Down to the last | 
quarter of the fourth century, when it suddenly vanished from those \ 
pages of history which the monks have chosen to spare, there existed 
in the capital of the Roman empire, first at Rome, afterwards at 
Constantinople, a pagan ecclesiastical college, or corporation, 
whose origin was traced, by the pious, back to the mythical Numa, 
while some have even extended its antiquity to the still more myth- 
ical Romulus. The functions of this college were the superintendence 
of religion, the custody of the Code of Procedure, the trial and de- 
termination of ecclesiastical causes, the regulation of public wor- 
ship, the erection and custody of religious temples, shrines and 
sanctuaries, the appointment, government and reward or punish- 
ment of legates, bishops, priests, curates,^ chaplains, augurs, ves- 
tal virgins, monks and other ministers and servants of religion, 
the control regulation and custody of the calendar, the regulation 
of money, and of weights and measures, (Lanciani,) the educa- 
tion of youth, the direction and observance of religious rites, con- 
secrations, festivals, plays, games and ceremonies, the solemnization 
of birth, baptism, (or nundination,) puberty, purification, confession, 
adolescence, marriage, divorce, death, burial, excommunication, can- 
onization, deification, adoption into families, adoption into tribes 
and orders of nobility, also the registration or custody or both of 
wills and testaments, conveyances, religious images, paintings, sym- 

* The priests of Maia were called curetes. This name was derived from the Greek 
term for tonsured. The curetes were eunuch-monks, who lived in common and had 
charge of the Maian schools. They swayed their bodies and ambled, or danced, in 
the processions of Maia. Their heads were tonsured, leaving scalp-locks, crests, or 
cristas, to top them. Lucretius, 11, 629; written about B. C. 55. See also Virgil, 
Georgics, 151. 



I02 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

bols, scriptures, relics and sepulchres, and of consecrated lands and 
treasures. The construction of bridges and other public works, which 
in ancient times had been entrusted to the pontifex-maximus,^ was 
during the Commonwealth divested of a religious character and placed 
in charge of the censors ^ and at a latter period committed to the 
sediles {a cura cedium) especially when there were no censors ^ and af- 
terwards to the quaestors. The same may be said of the custody of 
conveyances. With the triumph of Julius Cjesar, the ecclesiastics 
again secured control of municipal affairs, this time in every city of 
the empire except Rome and Constantinople, which for a time re- 
mained in the hands of a local prsefects or governors.' Yet so early 
as the reign of Claudius the paving and repairing of the streets of 
Rome was taken from the quaestors and the prsefects were probably 
only premitted to superintend such functions and offices as were not 
not especially renumerative.® 

The ecclesiastical title to these lucrative prerogatives will be found 
in those institutes of ancient Rome which rendered sacred, and there- 
fore remitted to the care of the pontifex-maximus, the walls and ram- 
parts of cities and the boundaries of lands; so that the former could 
neither be erected nor repaired, nor the latter altered, without his 
authority. Under these institutes the construction and repair of all 
public works in cities, whether established, or to be established, was 
claimed for the church. Such works included ports, acqueducts, 
bridges, castles, walls, temples, baths, roads, streets, sewers, and the 
repair and cleaning of the same.^ 

So long as these lucrative prerogatives remained with the chief- 
pontiff, who was also the emperor, the latter had no need to summon 
either legislature or " estates " for the purpose of granting him sup- 
plies. When the sovereign-pontiff ceased to be such, these lucrative 
prerogatives remained with the chief-pontiff. This compelled the 
emperor, and, after the 13th century, the proconsuls or provincial 
kings who assumed the emperor's now lost authority, to summon the 
owners of the estates (and livings) within their respective realms, not, 

■* The first bridge, pons, pontem, over the Tiber (a sacred river) is said to liave been 
constructed by or under the pontifex-maximus; it was placed in his custody and he 
exacted tolls for its use; circumstances which have been held to sufficiently explain 
the singular title of his office. Juvenal, vi, 520; Varro, 1., v, 83, 180; Plutarch, in 
Numa, p. 75. But this is very doubtful. On this subject consult a note in "The 
Worship of Augustus Csesar." 

* Livy, IX, 29. * Cic. de Legg., in, 3. 

' Gibbon, chap. xvii. *Suet., Claud., 24. 

^Cod. Just. I, I, tit. IV, § 26; Ibid, 30; Ibid, tit. lv. § 8, etc.; Guizot, i, 36. 



FIRST INSTITUTES OF THE SACERDOTAL EMPIRE, IO3 

as at a still later period, to deliberate and legislate upon national af- 
fairs, but merely to grant him supplies. Such was not the origin but 
the immediate cause of the medieval revival of the Comitia or House 
of Commons. The connection of modern vestries with municipal 
works, repairs, etc., has also its remote origin in the prerogatives of 
the pontifex-maximus. A succession of reforms has swept away the 
ecclesiastical character of English vestry boards. Their members 
are now elected by the parochial suffragists, nevertheless the chair- 
man of such bodies, is still the parish priest, ex officio; the tail of a 
kite whose head is lost in the clouds of the remotest antiquity. *" 

During the Commonwealth, the Sacred college was subject to the 
civil power " and mainly relied for popular compliance with its de- 
crees and regulations, upon that general assent which superstition or 
veneration induced in the public mind. In addition to this, it man- 
aged to obtain the enactment of laws, from time to time, which con- 
ferred upon it important privileges, concerning the exercise of which 
it frequently came into collision with the civil magistrates. Toward 
the end of the Commonwealth these disputes commonly ended in favour 
of the ecclesiastical power. Nevertheless until the accession of Julius 
Caesar an appeal could always be made to the people. The ecclesi- 
astical power was commonly manifested in the infliction of fines and 
penalties, but occasionally as in trials for heresy it extended to life 
and death. The pontifex-maximus, even the augurs, at one time, 
could control the Senate, through the privilege of interdicting their as- 
semblage and vetoing their laws. '^ Whilst it should not be forgotten 
that Cicero himself was an augur and a member of the college of 
augurs, and — for this reason as well because he had been deprived of 
every other public office, may not have been indisposed to exaggerate 
its powers or prerogatives, — it should also be remembered that what- 

'" In the United States, although the Constitution is itself a protest against hierarch- 
ical government, these lucrative functions in many of the large cities, are now in fact, 
under the control of a single powerful sect. The practice would be equally objection- 
able and dangerous were these advantages in the hands of any other sect. 

" In A, U. 449 Caius Flavins, curule jedile, " made public the Rules of Procedure 
in judicial cases, hitherto shut up in the closets of the pontiffs and hung up to public 
view round the forum the Calendar on white tablets; so that all might know when busi- 
ness could be transacted in the Courts." Livy, ix, 46. For this assertion of popular 
rights this intrepid magistrate was called a thief, the son of a slave, a contemptible 
cur, a polluted person, and many other hard names, by the pontiffs whose monstrous 
monopoly of the Code and the Calendar he had broken down. Moyle's exposition of 
this subject is one of the few that have been written from, I will not say the popular, 
but the anti-aristocratic point of view. 

^'^ Cicero de Legg., 11, 12. 



I04 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

ever powers the augurs possessed in his time, they all fell soon after 
into the hands of the pontifical college. 

With the subversion of the commons, the tribunes, and the other 
institutes of ancient liberty, and the elevation of the Sacred college 
and pontificate to temporal power, the republican limits to the author- 
ity of the Roman church, were swept away. The right of appeal to 
a jury of the people was altogether lost; and what technical shred 
remained of it was abrogated by Augustus. The power of the pontifex- 
maximus being united in the same person with that of the emperor, 
it extended to temporal as well as ecclesiastical matters and became 
as ample in one as the other. '^ Even its vicarious exercise, which 
in the end broke it down entirely, at the beginning conferred upon 
it additional strength; for it afforded the sovereign-pontiff relief from 
the cares of a too extended government and enabled an immediate 
improvement to be made in the local administration of the more dis- 
tant provinces. The sovereign-pontiff appointed the members of the 
Sacred college and conferred upon them powers to ordain bishops. 
The latter in turn, appointed the inferior priests, and this involution 
of offices and powers continued downward to the lowest stratum of 
ecclesiastical rank. 

Even were there no traditional and other evidences to connect the 
ecclesiastical organization of the fourth century with the remote pe- 
riods assigned to Romulus and Numa, the power, the influence, the re- 
spectability, the numbers, the social ties and connections of the priest- 
hood, the extent and completeness of their organization, the vast 
number of temples and other edifices and landed estates under their 
control in all parts of the empire, their numerous benefices, some of 
them dating as far back as the history of the empire, the vast wealth 
of the church and the substantial support it derived from taxation, 
whether the government was monarchical, or imperial, the widespread 
belief in its tenets, mythology, superstitions, rites, festivals, sacri- 
fices, miracles, auguries, oracles and relics, all these and many other 
circumstances, combine to attest its venerable character and high 
antiquity. That Rome was not built in a day is an axiom that ap- 
plies as well to its ecclesiastical organization as to its walls and temples. 

In the most ancient times the Sacred college had consisted of four 
pontifices, bishops, flamens, or priests, appointed by the Sacred rex 
or king, who himself was the pontifex-maximus. During the Com- 
monwealth their number was increased, but they were appointed by 

'^ To appeal from the emperor to the Sacred College "was a mockery that turned 
all religion to a jest." Tacitus, Annals, i, lo. 



FIRST INSTITUTES OF THE SACERDOTAL EMPIRE. 105 

the Comrrrons. At first the College, afterwards the Commons, elected 
the chief-priest, who had his office for life, one of the conditions of 
his incumbency obliging him never to remove out of Italy. '* In A. U. 
453 the number of pontifices was increased to eight, in 672 to 15, 
and at the instigation of Julius Caesar, to 16, he, himself, soon after, 
becoming the i6th and the pontifex-maximus. After the death of 
Caesar and the battle of Actium, the Senate granted formal permis- 
sion to the Prince of the Senate, Augustus, to add to the Sacred 
college as many pontiffs as he deemed proper: also to increase and 
provide for the regulation of the subordinate fraternities of priests. 
This act enabled Augustus to complete and render more perfect than 
before, that involution of ecclesiastical ranks and livings, which had 
already received a powerful impetus during the pontificate of Julius 
Caesar. Further details concerning this subject will be found in 
Appendix H. 

The religious fraternities governed by the Sacred college included 
the augurs, the decemvirs or quindecemvirs, the septemvirs, the 
various subordinate religious colleges, such as theLuperci, (including 
the Juliana, Augustines, etc.,) theSalii and Galli already mentioned, 
the parish-priests and local curates stationed in various parts of the 
empire, amounting in number to many thousands; also numerous 
bodies of monks, clerks and ecclesiastical virgins and slaves. The 
entire organization, except perhaps with reference to certain nominal 
imposts levied at times upon the inferior clergy and monks, was ex- 
empt from military service, civic duties, and taxation. The property 
and revenues of the church were deemed to be sacred or consecrated 
to the gods, and appear to have been entirely exempt from taxation. " 

After the death of the chief-pontiff Lepidus, A. U. 741, Augustus 
himself assumed the office of pontifex-maximus, held it until his death 
and transmitted it to his imperial successors. Although the chief- 
priesthood thus remained a pagan office, marked by pagan rites and 
sacrifices, down to the day when the state religion was changed by 
vote of the Senate, yet it was filled, between Constantine and Gratian, 
by no less than seven so-called Christian emperors. Gibbon's remark 
that they were invested with more authority over the religion they 
had deserted, than the one they professed, is only true in the sense 
that their pagan authority extended to lands, temples, and lucrative 

'* Livy, XXVIII, 38-48. One reason for thus confining the pontifex-maximus to Italy, 
may have been the danger of exposing the vocal and bleeding images (Livy, xxvii,4) 
the relics, calendars, and other impostures of the pagan Sacred College, to the inspec- 
tion of a doubting multitude. ^^ Gibbon, in, 74, quoting Symmachus. 



Io6 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

offices, over which as yet the "Christian " priests had n3 legal au- 
thority. Zosimus, a writer of the fifth century, says that Gratian 
was the first emperor who declined to officiate as pontifex-maximus.'" 
Unfortunately for the historian's correctness in this particular, an 
issue of Gratian's coins is extant which plainly attests his acceptance 
and exercise of the office. " As an alternative theory, Gratian's modern 
apologists have advanced the unlikely notion that he accepted the 
title, whilst he repudiated the functions, of the pontifex-maximus. '^ 

The truth seems to be that at the period of Gratian the dividing 
line between Roman paganism and Roman Christianity was not always 
well marked. " Gratian's father, Valentinian, though he is claimed 
to have been a Christian convert, filled the office of apaganpontifex, 
gave no preference or advantage to any sect, forbade the Roman ec- 
clesiastics from appropriating any testamentary bequests but such as 
came to them as next of kin, and issued a general edict permitting 
the practice of polygamy. Gratian's counsellor, the famous Augus- 
tine of Hippo, was twice a pagan before he became once a Christian, 
and Gratian himself dismissed the priests of one religion to appoint 
in their places, those of another, himself remaining pontifex-maximus 
and emperor of both. The belief that it was justifiable to devote to 
Christian, those riches, powers and privileges, which had been origin- 
ally consecrated to pagan beneficiaries, had now apparently spread 
far enough from its source, to warrant Gratian in confiscating them 
to the fisc. The revolt of pagan Britain and Gaul, and the tragic fate 
of Gratian, merely prove that in this belief he was mistaken. 

During the Commonwealth, the Roman ecclesiastical organization 

was largely supported by voluntary contributions and the offerings of 

the pious; but it possessed no livings and commanded no tithes. 

Ante, Deos homini quod conciliare valeret, 

Far erat, et puri lucida mica salis. — Ovid, ^'Fasii," i, 337. 

According to their several means, the people vowed temples, shrines, 
games, (whence ludi votivi) jewels, food, or flowers, to the gods. Ver 
sacrum, or the young of all edible animals, born from the beginning 
of the year (in March) to the end of the month of April, was a com- 
mon offering to the church. So was a tenth of the spoils, taken in 
war, and in later times, the golden crowns displayed in military tri- 
umphs. These and other voluntary offerings were the relics of com- 

^^ Zosimus, IV, 249-50. 

'' This is admitted by Guizot. '^ Bell's Pantheon, i, 19. 

'® The commonest mark of distinction was between those who did, and those who 
did not, sacrifice. 



FIRST INSTITUTES OF THE SACERDOTAL EMPIRE. 107 

pulsory dues that had gone before, and the progenitors of others that 
were to appear in future. Thus, Lucian says that a tithe of the spoils 
of war were devoted by the Greeks to the temple of Mars, whilst 
Xenophon relates that a tithe of the produce of certain lands was an- 
nually devoted to the priests of Diana, ^" and Sillius, that the Gaditan 
chaplains or parasites exacted corn and other tithes for Hercules, 
which they gathered into the temple. ^^ The first may have been a 
voluntary offering, the other examples have all the appearance of a 
t-ax. Herodotus, viii, 46, relates that the Siphnians reserved a tithe 
of the produce of their gold mines for Apollo, but omits to say whether 
it was an offering or a tax. In some countries, at the present day, 
it is necessary to reserve a tithe, or more, of the produce of gold- 
mining for the local priesthood ; not that the law commands, but that 
policy and experience advise it. The Siphnian tithe may have been 
of this character. 

The Brahmin, Buddhist, Assyrian, Egyptian, Hebrew" and other 
ancient hierarchies, all exacted tithes from the people for the support 
of the church. The imposition of tithes by Julius or Augustus was 
therefore no novelty. The latter not only increased the authority 
and emoluments, commoda, of the bishops, priests, and vestal virgins, 
he also devoted to their support the tithes, decumse, of certain landed 
estates, which tithes he vested in the church. His imposition of a 
twentieth, vigesima hcereditatum, upon inheritances, is also, without 
doubt, an ecclesiastical tax: because the church had authority over 
the framing and registration of wills and testaments, and would hardly 
have risked the loss of such authority by submitting inheritances to 
secular taxation, at least not without interposing the most formidable 
objections and obstacles. The real or assumed piety of Augustus, 
which was so great that once a year he used in person, to publicly 
solicit alms for the church, affords an assurance, apart from all other 
considerations, of his repugnance to any measures which would have 
neglected to strengthen the resources of the Sacred college. ^^ 

Tiberius erected 12 villas in Caprse which he consecrated to the 
principal gods of ancient Rome. The rentals of these villas, if any, 
must have gone to the church, because it would have been sacreligious 
to divert them to any other purpose. Speaking generally, the pagan 
church of the empire received from the consecrated lands and the 
public revenue an ample stipend, which liberally supported the splen- 
dour of the priesthood and all the expenses of the religious worship 

20 De Exped. Cyri., lib., v. ''^ Taylor, 232. 

^^ I Sam., VIII, 15-17. ^^Suet., Aug., 49; Dio., LV, 25. 



Io8 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

of the State. ^* Not only was the religion of Rome supported from the 
public coffers, it was the lawful duty of the Senate to maintain it, and 
of the prjetors and sediles to enforce such of its observances as the 
priesthood declared to be essential. " In A. U. 327, "the sediles 
were instructed to see that no other deities should be worshipped 
than those acknowledged by the Romans, nor even these, in any other 
modes than those established by the custom of the country."*® In 
A. U. 540, the worship of les having been introducted into Rome, 
the sediles and criminal judges were sharply rebuked by the aristo- 
cratic Senate for tolerating the votaries of this popular deity and the 
city prffitor was ordered to suppress their assemblages, burn their 
scriptures, and forbid the practice of their rites without special per- 
mission of the Senate. " 

In A. U. 548 the worship of Maia was brought to Rome from Gala- 
tia by authority of the Senate. In 566 the rites of les were again 
introduced into Rome and supported by "false witnesses, counter- 
feited seals, forged wills, false evidences and pretended miracles." 
One of the consuls thereupon cited to the Senate, "numberless de- 
cisions of the pontiff, decrees of the Senate, and answers of the 
aruspices," concerning the right to deal with this subject, and the 
"frequent charges that had been made to the magistrates to prohibit 
the performance of any foreign religious rites, to banish strolling 
priests and soothsayers from the city, to search for and burn books 
of divination and to abolish every mode of sacrificing that was not 
conformable to the Roman practice. " The result was that he obtained 
the enactment of a decree " prohibiting the performance of any the 
like rites in Rome or in Italy," and providing for the exercise of other 
religious rites only after the express authority of the Senate had been 
obtained therefor and when not less less than 100 members should be 
present, and also on condition that the persons so authorized "should 
have no common stock of money, nor any presiding officer of cere- 
monies, nor any priests." *^ " Does not the religion of the Romans 
come under the protection of the Roman laws? " asked Symmachus, 
in a later age, confident that there was but one reply to such a ques- 
tion. 

It results from these premises that down to the year A. D. 394, when, 
as alleged, the Senate reformed the national religion, there was but 

^* Gibbon, iii, 71, 

*^ Among these, according to Livy and Tacitus, was the worship of images. 
** Livy, IV, 30. ^'' Livy, xxv, i. Moyle's Works, vol. i. 

** This appears to have remained the law to the last. Livy, xxxix, 8, 18. 



FIRST INSTITUTES OF THE SACERDOTAL EMPIRE. IO9 

one chief-pontiff, and one set of priests with lawful power to superin- 
tend or perform the functions of religion in Rome, and that these 
priests were pagans. It is conceivable that there existed a secret so- 
ciety of chrestos or christianos, which gradually increased in num- 
bers, until, venturing to exercise its rites openly, it filled the aimy, 
the senate, and the church; that at length it took part in choosing the 
emperor; and that it finally succeeded in acquiring control of the 
ancient hierarchy; but any theory which asks us to believe that two 
popes, of antagonistic creeds, the one polytheistic, the other Chris- 
tian, the one armed with almost unlimited power, the other with 
none, existed contemporaneously and exercised similar functions over 
the same community, lawfully and publicly, is simply incredible/" 
During the three centuries which elapsed between the establish- 
ment of the hierarchy and the reign of Aurelian, the pagan church had 
acquired, through testamentary gifts, etc., a large proportion of all 
the private estates embraced in the empire. As the number of priests 
and their requirements, together with the habits of indulgence which 
such a system engendered, increased even more rapidly than the con- 
secrated lands, it is quite probable that while the church and the bish- 
ops grew ^ich, the common priests and ecclesiastical servants became 
poor. Yet, if we may believe Vopiscus, a single temple of Rome was 
enriched by Valerian with fifteen thousand pounds weight of gold, 
while all the others were resplendent with the richness of his offer- 
ings.'" Vast as were the property and revenues of the pagau church, 
the edict of Valentinian proves that they were still increasing, when 
they were all confiscated to the imperial fisc during the brief reign of 
Gratian." Constantine had already made a breach in this ancient and 
towering edifice, which his sons Constantius and Constans had been 
importuned to v/iden ; but Gratian attempted to overthrow it with one 
blow, an attempt that cost him his life. When Theodosius had duly 
avenged the death of this martyr, he granted the ecclesiastical estates 

^^ Valesius himself, in several passages, admits that there were no christian " popes " 
until near the fifth century. He says that at the council of Antioch, Paul of Samosata 
was condemned without the participation of Dionysus, bishop in Rome. Julius, bishop 
in Rome 337-52, "who was neither ignorant of his privileges nor disposed to relin- 
quish any right " . . . " disclaimed everything beyond the courtesy of being in- 
vited to attend and being consulted with the other bishops." Socrates, Ecc. Hist. 
Pref., vi. For list of Pagan popes see Appendix H herein. 

^^ Vop. in Aur., xli. 

^' Sir Henry Maine in one of his lectures delivered at Oxford, said that (similarly) 
the m^oslem church was endowed with the lands and livings of the pagan church which 
it supplanted. 



no ■ THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED, 

and livings of the church to incumbents of the true faith. Such of the 
bishops and priests as had not embraced Christianity (for many of the 
latter had done so already) were expelled from their offices and re- 
placed by others/^ 

The members of the pagan Sacred College wore a white linen robe, 
bordered with purple, and a conical cap. The chief pontiff and the 
augurs wore a similar costume, with the addition of a crooked staff, 
called lituus. Such a staff appears in the hands, both of Romulus 
and Julius Csesar, as they are depicted on contemporanous, at all 
events very ancient, altars, gems and medals.'^ The Romans wor- 
shipped with their heads covered and facing toward the east. A head- 
covering was also worn by deified personages and was called peplum. 
These or similar customs were common with all races who derived 
their religion from India and are practised by the Jews to this day, 
who call their sacred head-covering, talith or tallas. On the eve of 
the battle of Issus, Alexander summoned Aristander, the hierophant, 
who, habited in white and with his head veiled, joined the king in 
praying to Jove for victory.^* Vitellius, his head covered with a veil, 
prostrated himself before Caligula and adored him as god.^^ 

In addition to the details already mentioned, the Roman pagan 
college and ecclesiastical organization was characterised by a pecu- 
liar observance in the appointment of priests. The priests of the 
Brahmins, Assyrians, Egyptians, '® Israelites, Greeks and other na- 
tions of a remote antiquity, other than Buddhists, were selected from 
sacerdotal or aristocratic classes. To this day, after the repeated 
dispersion of their defenceless communities and religious congrega- 
tions, the Jews will not permit certain of their public ceremonies to 
be performed, by any, except members, real or supposed, of the sacer- 
dotal class known as cohanes or cohens. " The ancient Greek priests 
obtained their offices variously by inheritance, lot, appointment or 
election, but except during the republic they always came from sacred 
tribes. '* On the contrary, the priests of Rome were drawn from all 
classes of the people. 

Monachism. Philo and other Platonists, renounced their patri- 
monies and lived in common, " the Greek priests of Hercules practised 

^^Zosimus, IV, 249; v, 38; Code Theod. de Pagan Sacrif. et Templis. 
^*Livy, I, 18,41; XXXIII, 28; Festus; Varro, vi, 3; Virg, ^n.,ii, 683; vii,6i2; viii, 
664; x, 270; Cic. Legg., I, i; Cic. Fam., 11, 16; Att., 11, 9: Divin., i, 17. 
34 Q. Curtius. IV, 13. ^^ Suet. Vitellius, 2. 

3« Herodotus, Euterpe. " See Coenobites, below. 

3« Eustathius, ^^ Sozomen, i, 12. 



FIRST INSTITUTES OF THE SACERDOTAL EMPIRE. Ill 

celibac3% the Greek sect of Perfectionists strove to overcome their 
natural tendencies by drinking the juice of hemlock and strewing; 
the herb agnus castus in their beds, while the priests of Maia and 
other ascetics shaved their heads and, like Atis the Mediator, made 
themselves " eunuchs for the Kingdom of Heaven's sake."" The 
Therapeuts withdrew from the world, buried themselves in monas- 
teries, and passed their time in religious contemplation, seasoned by 
discipline, self-mortification, fastings, prayers, hymns, canticles, vig- 
ils and genuflexions. Monks abounded in India from the remotest 
times, also in ancient Assyria, Egypt, Greece, Gaul, Galatia and 
Rome. According to Sozomen, the Therapeuts and Essenes were 
the same. Their "monasteries were established before the Christian 
sera," some in Palestine, and, in the place of one of these, afterwards 
arose the fraternity of Carmelite monks and nuns. " We may see some 
traces of these people (monks) among the Druids. They existed be- 
fore Christianity, lived in monasteria or monasteries, and were called 
"coenobites," because they lived in common. " In A. U. 566 the 
Roman Senate passed a law against religious brotherhoods whose 
members lived in common. " Josephus in early life was a monk. ** 
Mark, the Evangelist, was regarded as an ascetic. " "As many as 
were possessors of lands or houses sold them and brought the prices 
(proceeds) of the things that were sold and laid them down at the 
apostle's feet, and distribution was made to every man according as 
he had need. " ^^ " Many (monks) dwelt in each city and the provider 
for the faction is especially discernible among strangers by his engage- 
ment in storing up clothing and necessary articles. " "' " They lived 
in monasteries, maintained a perfect community of goods and an 
equality of external rank, deeming vassalage a violation of natural 
law."" 

These evidences are deemed sufficient to establish the great an- 
tiquity of monachismand its practice under the constitution erected 
by Julius Caesar and before the adoption of Christianity. 

Canonization. It was the duty of the pagan pontifex-maximus, as- 
sisted by the Sacred college over which he presided, to appoint and 
register the public holidays and festivals. In this registry or canon 

*" Compare Matthew xix, 12; Leviticus, xxi, 5, 20; Herodotus, Thalia, 8; Kennedy, 
Hindu Mythology, p. 263. 
*^ Livy, xxxix, 18; Higgins' Celtic Druids; Eusebius, Ecc. Hist., Ii, 16. 
^^ Celtic Druids, 125. ^^ Livy, xxxix, 18. 

^■* And lived in the desert on figs and nuts. See his autobiography. 
*^ Eusebius, 11, 16, 23. ** Acts, iv, 35. 

•*'' Josephus, Wars, 11, 4. *** Marsh's Michaelis, iv, 83. 



112 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

was also inscribed (adscriptum est) the most remarkable occurrences. 
Thus on Lupercalia it was noted in the canon that Antony had offered 
the crown of empire to Julius. To have one's name inscribed or 
canonized was deemed by the Romans an honour of the rarest charac- 
ter, a most sacred and exalted distinction. Julius, Augustus and many 
of their successors were canonized in the fasti of the Sacred college. 
Other persons besides emperors of Rome were canonized, and vows, 
wishes, oaths, offerings and sacrifices were made in their names. " 

Sanctuaries. Altars and temples were regarded by both Greeks 
and Romans as places of refuge or asyla, some of them, as previously 
mentioned, being clothed with peculiar sanctity. Here slaves found 
refuge from the cruelty of their masters, children from inhuman 
fathers, debtors from creditors, and the accused from the officers of 
the law. From these sanctuaries it was deemed impious to attempt 
their removal. ^° Suetonius says that Tiberius "abolished the privi- 
leges and customs of asyla in all parts of the world," while Tacitus, 
with more reason, says that he only regulated and reformed their 
abuse. ^' 

Sacred Scriptures. Among other functions the Quindecemvirs or 
Holy Fifteen " had the care of the ludi sseculares and the custody of 
the Ten ^' Sibylline books, or gospel of the pagan Romans, which 
contained the prophesies and revelation relating to the fate of the 
empire and also (according to Niebuhr) the religious ceremonial. In 
conformity with aregulation of Augustus, two thousand "spurious" 
gospels were burnt by the praetor urbanus, while the "genuine " books 
were preserved in two gilt caskets deposited under the statue of 
Apollo in the temple of that god on the Palatine. " One of the of- 

*^ Nero deified his dead wife Poppsea Sabina and erected a temple to her in which 
she was worshipped as Sabina dea Veneris, or Sabina, the goddess Venus. He also 
obtained a decree of the Senate deifying the infant daughter whom she bore him, 
namely, Claudia entitled Augusta. The inscription on her medals is Diva Claudia 
Neronis Filia, or the goddess Claudia, daughter of Nero. On the antiquity of this 
custom consult Ovid, Fasti, i, 9; Tac. Ann., i, 15; iii, 17; Cic. Ep. ad Brut., 15; 
Cic. Sext., 14; Pis., 13; Verr., 11, 53; iv, fin.; and the numerous authorities in " Nim- 
rod " (Herbert). 

^''Cic. Tusc, I, 35; Nat. D., iii, 10; Dom., 41; Nep. Paus., 4; Ovid, Trist., v, 2, 
43; Tac, Ann., in, 60; iv, 14; Virg. JEn., i, 349; il, 513, 550. 

^' Suet. Tiberius, 37; Tacit. Ann., iii 60-3, 

*^ Originally, duumviri (2); in A.U. 387 decemviri (10); in tempo Sylla, quindecem- 
viri (15); and according to some authors, in tempo Julius Caesar, sexdecemviri (16); 
alluding to their numbers. 

^^ Some authors say there were nine or even a fewer number of Sibylline books; but 
Varro distinctly says there were ten books. =■* Suet. Aug., 31. 



FIRST INSTITUTES OF THE SACERDOTAL EMPIRE. I 13 

fices of the Holy Fifteen was<o assist the sovereign-pontiff in managing 
the multitude by adducing whenever necessary the pretended commu- 
nications from heaven of which they were in charge. As the Sibylline 
gospels often controlled the policy of the State, they are entitled 
to a place in the constitution. " Another revision of these gospels 
was made by the emperor Tiberius, and many passages, regarded as 
heretical, were stricken out. Three other revisions are mentioned 
in subsequent reigns; and copies of them appear to have got into the 
hands of the people, by all of whom they were regarded with the 
deepest religious veneration. Indeed they are referred to, or quoted, 
in support of Christianity by several of the early Christian writers, 
from Tertullian to Lactantius. ^^ When the temple of Apollo was 
burnt March i8, A. D. 363, the only treasure saved was the Sibylline 
scriptures. " These gospels remained in common use until the reign 
of Theodosius, "when the greater part of the Senate having em- 
braced the Christian faith, such vanities began to grow out of fashion, 
till at last Stilicho burnt them all, under Honorius. *' For this act, 
real or supposed, Stilicho is elegantly cursed by the metrical Rutilius 
Numantianus. But after the erection ofthe empire, the Sibylline books, 
albeit some fragments of them remain to the present^ay, never en- 
joyed the popularity of the ^neid. The word bible means literally 
a book. In this sense there can be no impropriety in calling Virgil's 
epic, the Roman Bible. It was in the hands of all who could read, 
and though this class, after the division of the empire, diminished so 
rapidly that "for several centuries it was extremely rare to meet 
with a laymen who could readorwJte," ^^ yet its fabulous legends ex- 
ercised a powerful influence in polluting the sources of history. Mr. 
Buckle has said that " the Christian priests have obscured the annals 
of every European people they converted, and have destroyed or cor- 
rupted the traditions of the Gauls, of the Welsh, of the Irish, of the 
Anglo-Saxons, of the Sclavonic nations, of the Finns and even of the 
Icelanders," and he cites, in support of this assertion, Villemarque, 
Prichard, Warton, Campbell, Kemble, Talvi, Keightley and other 
modern writers. But although he furnishes the very instances we 
are about to mention, he ascribes no portion of this pollution to the 
Roman priests of the empire who preceded the Christians and taught 
the divinity of Caesar from the Sibylline books, the ^neid, the As- 

'* See the prophecy concerning Augustus from Virgil's ^neid, quoted previously. 
'^Lactantius, i, 6; li, 11-12; iv, 6. " Lanciani. 

'^ Kennett, Roman Ant., p. 81. We may believe as much of this as we please. 
'^ Buckle, Hist. Civ., chap, vi, p. 222. 



114 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

tronomicon and other gospels and writings of the pagan Romans; nor 
does he blame the pagan Greeks their predecessors. 

That the city of Troyes was founded by the Trojans; that the capi- 
tal of Gaul was named from Paris, the son of Priam; that Tours was 
the burial place of Turonus; that the Tartars came from Tartarus; 
that the Franks were descended from Francus, the son of Hector; 
and the Britons were from Brutus or Brute, the son of ^neas; all 
these, and many other like verities, were commonly believed during 
the dark and medieval ages. " Indeed, at the beginning of the four- 
teenth century their Trojan origin was stated (claimed) as a notorious 
fact, in a letter written to pope Boniface by king Edward I. , and signed 
by the English nobility.""" Now none of this nonsense came from 
either the Old Testament or the New; its source was not the Scrip- 
tures either of the Jews or the Christians, but the religious books of 
Roman polytheism, the bible of Julius the God, and of Augustus the 
Son of God. And strange to say, such is the longevity of sacred 
myth, or the scarcity of elegaic verse, one of these books, the ^neid, 
though bereft of much of its ancient significance by false translations 
and misleading foot-notes, is still taught in our universities. 

Succession to the Throne. Following the sacred example of Julius, 
in his adoption and appointment of Augustus, the emperors, acting 
as high-priests, down to the failure of the so-called Julian line with 
Nero, always appointed their own successor, previously conferring 
upon him, the titles, dignities and powers, such for example, as be- 
longed to the consular, censorial and tribunitian offices, which were 
designed to pave his way to the throne. These appointments, as a 
matter of form and out of respect for the ancient Commonwealth, were 
submitted to and confirmed by the senate. The elevation of Claudius 
by the praetorian guards was an exception to these rules of appoint- 
ment and confirmation. With the reign of Nero, the sacerdotal au- 
thority of the emperor, or what remained of it, fell, for a time, into 
contempt, and the succession was arranged in other ways; sometimes 
by agreement between the various proconsuls, or between the pro- 
consuls, praetorian guard and senate; sometimes by the decision of 
the praetorian guard alone; sometimes as in the previous aera, by the 
reigning pontiff, with or without consulting the senate, as when Valen- 

*" Buckle, Hist. Civ., chap, vi, p. 224W., citing Warton's Hist, of English Poetry, 
I, 131-2 and Campbell's Lives of the Chancellors, i, 185. According to the " Verney 
Memoirs," recently edited by Lady Frances P. Verney, the ^neid, so late as the reign 
of Charles II,, and for the purpose of forecasting fate by reference to chance verses, 
was of equal authority with the Bible. Fabian is the authority for the British Brutus. 



FIRST INSTITUTES OF THE SACERDOTAL EMPIRE. I15 

tinian I. appointed his son Gratian, and often by usurpation, or by feu- 
dal division of the empire. The steps by which an hierarchical govern- 
ment gradually becomes feudalised and splits into innumerable king- 
doms, holding a more and more shadowy relation toward one another, 
are as difficult to summarize as is the gradual emergence of a tem- 
poral empire out of such feudal materials. The maxim of Virginius 
Ruf us, who for a time, saved the throne of Nero, by suppressing the 
Gaulish insurrection under Julius Vindex, that *' the senate and peo- 
ple had the sole right of creating an emperor " was the theory of a 
patriot, not of a politician, of one who forgot that he was living under 
an hierarchy, and that hierarchies are always and necessarily supreme 
and infallible. Indeed, Virginius' theory was practically upset in the 
very next choice of a supreme ruler." 

Infallibility. Is was a necessary institution of the hierarchy that 
the chief-pontiff was infallible; otherwise his personal assumption or 
acceptance of divinity, his divine descent, his divine mission, his di- 
vine authority, etc., might have been questioned, with the inevitable 
result of bringing down the whole impious structure to the ground. 

Crimen Majestatis. Mention of this offense has already been made 
in connection with the worship of Julius Csesar. The name of Ma- 
jestas, one of the inferior deities, the daughter of Honour and Rever- 
ence, was applied to a law, which, before the advent of Julius Caesar, 
only affected those who had betrayed their country. ^'^ Afterwards 
it was applied to anyone guilty of irreverence to the sovereign-pontiff. 
The law was probably employed by Julius to protect the sacerdotal 
character of the pontifex-maximus. During the earlier periods of the 
empire, trials for majestas, were usually conducted by the Senate, 
in whose deliberations the offended sovereign-pontiffs themselves, 
often and unjustly, took part. Bare accusation, supported by the 
flimsiest proofs, often by no proof at all, was commonly tantamount 
to conviction, and conviction to death. Thus a woman was put to 
death merely because she appeared en deshabille before the statue of 
the sacred Caligula. *' Many persons, when accused of "sacred treason," 
and in order to avoid the confiscation of property and dishonour of 
name which attended conviction, committed suicide. The capital 

** The phrase " King by the Grace of God " probably originated in the feudal ap- 
pointments made by the deified sovereign-pontifl of Rome. The latter was the "god " 
who appointed the king. Either this, or else the god was manufactured from the title 
of the law. It is not always practicable to follow the chronology of pagan ecclesias- 
tical conceits. At the same time it needs but little effort to detect the conceits. 

*^ Lex Cornelia. ^^ Montesquieu, chap. xiv. 



Il6 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

was filled with spies and informers, employed either by the sovereign- 
pontiff, or his ministers. Men of eminence or wealth wisely betook 
themselves in time to some urban retreat or distant province; for no 
man's head was safe who remained near the court. " In A. U. 815, 
(A. D. 62,) "the law of majestas had fallen into disuse and was now 
revived for the first time," says Tacitus. ^* Strange as it may appear, 
it was enforced with the view of finding a legal method for exercising 
imperial clemency towards one Antistius ; a proof that the constitu- 
tion of Julius and Augustus was already failing, and that circumstances 
pleaded for a change from hierarchical to more rational methods. 

Inquisition. A sacerdotal Court of Inquiry sat in A. U. 566 and 
punished with imprisonment, torture and death, the several thousand 
persons throughout Italy who were found guilty of what the patricians 
then considered the Bacchic heresy. This germ of religious perse- 
cution, planted by the ancient hierarchy of Romulus, bore but scant 
fruit during the Commonwealth, but when the hierarchy was restored 
by Julius Csesar, it sprang up anew, to exercise its cruel office, no 
longer by the warrant of a Senate, but the fiat of a tyrant. The In- 
quisition, though attempted to be exercised by the Western popes 
after their secession from the East in the eighth century, legally re- 
mained with the sovereign-pontiff of the empire, until the Fall of 
Constantinople in the 13th century, when its dreadful powers were 
permanently assumed by the Roman pontificate. 

Excommunication. This institute, like the preceding one, issued 
from the ancient hierarchy imputed to Romulus, it fell into disue- 
tude during the Commonwealth and was restored when the hierarchy 
was re-established by Julius Csesar. It is mentioned by both Livy 
and Cicero. 

Right of Assemblage. Livy, xxxix, 8, mentions a law of the Com- 
monwealth, A. U. 566, against assemblages (hetsrise.) It was pro- 
fessedly designed to prevent the clandestine exercise of unlawful 
religious rites. When, under Julius Csesar, the high-priest became 
also the sovereign of Rome, this law was applied to all assemblages, 
and thus the very first right of a Roman citizen of the Commonwealth 
passed into the keeping of the church. Porcius Latro, in his declam- 
ation against Catiline, c. 19, attributes to the tribune A. Gabinius, 
A. U. 685, a law which made it capital to hold any clandestine assem- 

^ A number of interesting prosecutions under this impious law are reported by 
Tacitus in his Annals, iii, 67, 70; iv, 6, 19, 21 ; and elsewhere. See also note to Pliny's 
Ep., vii, 33; also Ep., VIII, 6; and Dio., liv, 17. 

** Annals, xiv, 48. 



FIRST INSTITUTES OF THE SACERDOTAL EMPIRE. I17 

blages in the city; but while this account is probably correct as to 
the penalty, it can hardly be so in describing the offence; for, except 
as to religious gatherings, there appears to have been no restriction 
upon the citizen's right of assemblage until after the establishment 
of the empire. "^ 

Legislature. As already explained, this institute was established 
under the Commonwealth and needs no farther mention in this place, 
than that under the hierarchy, the people, and afterwards the cities, 
were deprived of all representation or legislative power, while the 
senate, though it appeared to exercise such power, became in re- 
ality little more than an imperial council, created, summoned, and 
governed, by the sovereign-pontiff. When the institute of a House 
of Commons was revived and established in the various kingdoms 
of the empire during the 13th century, the order of its resuscita- 
tion was precisely the reverse of that of its extinction. The king's 
council again became a senate and the boroughs were summoned 
merely to assist a magistrate, whom, when their ancient powers were 
fully restored, they sometimes deprived of authority. 

Juridical System. This is so fully explained in the author's "An- 
cient Britain" that nothing more need be said, in this place. We 
quote from this work : 

" Theoretically, the various official powers which Julius Caesar and 
Augustus absorbed into the imperial and pontifical office, put an end 
to the entire system of Roman law under the Commonwealth; prac- 
tically, the system was retained, but perverted. The forms remained, 
the essence was absorbed. The imperial absorption of power and its 
assumption of infallibility, rendered the processes of law little more 
than a mockery; and yet men are sometimes so well contented with 
a shadow in place of the substance, that this mockery has been kept 
up in Rome almost to the present day; for it is only within recent 
years that the Italians have shaken off the chains of an unreal and 
tyrannical imposture to accept the more beneficent, if less preten- 
tious, rule of a flesh-and-blood sovereign. Many writers have ex- 
pressed the deepest regret that the forensic literature of the empire 
is lost. We can see little to deplore in the circumstance. The sci- 
ence of law can gain nothing from perusing either the edicts of gods 
or the glosses of their parasites and panders. What was valuable in 
the Roman law came from the acts of a free people and a free Com- 

®* Some details as to the mode of administering this law may be gleaned from the 
letters of Pliny and his reports to Trajan, Ep., x, 43, 76, 93-4. One of these letters 
is quoted entire in a footnote to the next chapter. 



Il8 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

mons and Senate; acts which were afterwards reflected in the com- 
mentaries of that class of jurisconsults, known as Proculians or Pega- 
sians, who, in the faces of the most absolute and bloody tyrants that 
ever encumbered the earth, had the astounding temerity to proclaim 
and uphold the principles of freedom and the spirit of justice. These 
principles have survived. We have them in the precepts of Paulus, 
Gains, Papian, Ulpian and Modestinus; men who held aloft the torch 
of legal science long after it had become a criminal offence to ques- 
tion the slightest dictum of hierarchical rule." 

Education. During the Commonwealth, the education of Roman 
youth was entirely under the control of the pater familia, who might 
have educated his sons at home, or in a public school, or in a school 
taught by the priests of any one of the several denominations. Thus 
Virgil ^^ informs us that among the curates, of the Maian sect, some 
"bring up to their full growth, the young, the hope of the nation." 
The usual course was to place children under the care of literatori, 
or tutors, to learn the rudiments. They were afterwards sent to 
grammar schools, and finally, committed to the charge of prof essors. 
With the hierarchy, the schools gradually passed under the control 
of the pontificate. Though efforts were made in the reigns of Ha- 
drian and the Antonines to restore something of the old system, the 
design fell through, and the church retained an absolute power over 
the education of youth. It is claimed that at this period Christianity 
had been adopted by the State, and there seem to have been no pub- 
lic schools, but such as were subject to the Sacred college.'*^ 

The reader will perceive the significance of these details when they 
come to be applied to- the affairs of the Middle Ages. Meanwhile it 
becomes necesary to invite his attention to some other features of 
the Roman Constitution, 

^^ Georgics, IV, 162. 

*^ For some mention of Roman schools and popular education consult Pliny, Ep.. 
II, 18; IV, 13; IV, 25; Tacitus de Orat. and Lanciani's remarks on Roman graffiti. The 
Athenteum was founded by Hadrian. The Antonines multiplied public schools in ail 
parts of the empire. See Kennett's Essay on Rom. Educ;also Adams Antiq., xvand 
443 and Carr, 304, 331, 373. 



TI9 



CHAPTER VII. 

OTHER INSTITUTES OF THE SACERDOTAL EMPIRE. 

Censorial powers — Consular powers — Tribunitian powers — Praetorian guard and prse- 
fects — Revenue and Expenditure — Imperial prerogatives — Treasure trove — Mines — 
Coinage — Legal-tender — Lands — Wills and conveyances — Titles of nobility — Slavery 
— Provinces — Free cities — Fairs — Right of war, peace and treaties — Calendar — Foreign 
ambassadors and jus legationis — Corporations — Navigation laws — Public notaries — 
Weights and measures. 

THE Census and Censorial Power. The Census, which is claimed 
by some modern writers to have been originally an Etruscan 
institution, was imputed by the Romans to Servius Tullius. In A. U. 
312 two censors were appointed to number and enroll the people as 
soldiers and to estimate their property or incomes, at that period 
designed chiefly with the view to taxation. Refusal to enroll was 
punishable with confiscation of property, or with scourging, or 
slavery.* Refusal to give a true account of property was also pun- 
ishable. The censors were afterwards empowered by the senate to 
lease the public lands, farm the revenues, erect, repair, and lease 
public edifices, construct and repair roads, streets, bridges, aque- 
ducts, etc., and to appoint the aerarii. After the civil wars, during 
which the censorship fell under the influence of the church, it was 
clothed with the invidious and dangerous power to raise or lower the 
caste of a citizen, to fill vacancies in the ranks of the equites, to su- 
pervise all public spectacles ^ and to enquire into the moral character 
and habits of private persons. These various powers were all ab- 
sorbed by Julius, and afterwards by Augustus and their imperial suc- 
cessors. Tiberius and Caligula declined to personally exercise the 
office of censor, yet it was exercised in their names. When, during 
the dark ages, the emperor ceased to be the high-priest, the powers 
of the censorial office were divided and feudalized, the most impor- 
tant of them remaining, as before, under the control of the pon- 
tificate. 

' Cic, Csec, 21. 

^ The priesthood in all ages have recognized the powerful influence of dramatic ef- 
fects upon the public mind by seeking to control their exhibition. 



I20 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

The Consular Power. After the expulsion of the kings, A. U. 244, 
two consuls were elected annually. These jointly exercised the office 
of chief magistrate. Each consul was attended by twelve lictors, a 
custom of mythological or religious origin. Tlie consuls levied troops, 
commanded the army and navy, appointed military tribunes, admin- 
istered the treasury, assembled the people and senate, laid before them 
what public business they deemed proper, demanded their pleasure, 
executed their decrees, controlled the governors of provinces, and 
corresponded with, or gave audience to, subsidiary princes and foreign 
ambassadors. These powers were absorbed by Julius and Augustus 
and their imperial successors, all of whom, though already emperors, 
were formally elected consuls. Julius bestowed the title of consul upon 
others as a bribe to gratify aspirants for honours, sometimes retain- 
ing the incumbent in office but a few days, or hours. ^ Afterwards, 
besides the emperor, there were usually twelve consuls each year, 
those admitted on the first day of the year, giving to it its name.* 
During the reign of Nero, and possibly both before and afterwards, 
these consuls appear to have formed a cabinet, or privy council. That 
monarch stated in a communication to the senate that "Italy and the 
provinces might, in all cases, address themselves to the tribunal of 
the consuls and through that channel, find their way to the senate"/ 
In the reign of Commodus there were twenty-five consuls in one year, 
that is, two each month, beside the emperor.® During the minority 
of Alexander Severus and the regency of Mammea, the privy council 
consisted of sixteen patricians, but these were exceptional numbers. 
In A. U. 1293 Justinian abrogated the office of consul and the tribu- 
nal of twelve consuls, creating in its place twelve counts of the palace. 
In another place we shall see this same number repeated in the 
twelve peers of Clotaire,' the twelve paladini of Charlemagne,* and 
the twelve judices of Alfred. The function of all these bodies of twelve 
was analogous. They were, at first, to protect the person of the 
thirteenth.^ Next, they were the guardians of his honour, then, his 
advisors, and lastly, his judges." So far as the Romans are con- 
cerned, it may be safely assumed that this number was derived either 
from the twelve greater celestial deities, or the twelve constellations 
of the zodiac. Analogies occur in the twelve disciples of Buddha, the 

3 Lucan, v, 397; Suet. Jul., 76; Cic, Fam., vii, 30; Die, xliii, 36. 

4 Dio., XLViii; Lamprid., Alex. Sev., 28, 43. ^ Tacitus. Annals, xiii, 4. 
* Lampridinus, 6. ' Atwood, 67. 

« Matthew Paris. ® Gibbon, i, 8i«. 

•0 Atwood, 67. 



OTHER INSTITUTES OF THE SACERDOTAL EMPIRE. 12 1 

twelve tribes of Israel, the twelve majestri of the Persian Manes, etc. " 
The Tribunitian Power. Tribunes of the people were first created 
A. U. 260. They entered upon their office at the winter solstice, 
which at one time fell on December loth, but afterwards by the sink- 
ing of 15 days in the calendar, on December 25th. Their office was 
to protect the plebians from the patricians. The law rendered their 
persons sacred and inviolable. To molest them was made punishable 
by excommunication (sacer,) and confiscation.'^ In A. J. 297 their 
number was increased from two to ten. At first their function was 
limited to a veto upon the proceedings of the senate, but in course 
of time they were entrusted with many of the most important powers 
of the State, that is to say, powers relating to the comitia, the senate, 
the army, and the magistracy. In discharging this trust they offended" 
the wealthier plebians, who, joining the patricians, induced the tri- 
bunes by clamour, menaces and bribes, to neglect and abuse the 
powers of their office. The people being thus left without due repre- 
sentation or protection, broke into civil war. To appease the peo- 
ple, Marius restored the tribunes to their ancient functions and then 
betrayed them. Their powers were curtailed by Syllaand increased 
by Pompey. They were secretly encouraged by Julius Caesar in every 
excess, who, after having thus rendered them odious to the people, 
suddenly extinguished them, absorbed their powers, and bequeathed 
the latter to Augustus and his successors. The official shadows who 
bore the title of tribune during the empire, were abolished, together 
with numerous other ancient officials, by Constantine. 

Praetorian Guards and Prgefects. Augustus organized a body of 
about ten thousand picked troops, divided into cohorts of a thousand 
each, to protect his person, awe the senate, and check rebellion. 
These were afterwards increased to fifteen or sixteen thousand. 
They enjoyed double pay, besides numerous privileges and advan- 
tages. To avoid alarming the people, they were at first distrib- 
uted in various camps throughout Italy. Tiberius concentrated and 
stationed them in a strongly fortified enclosure under the walls of 
Rome. The supporters of this dangerous innovation claimed that 
the presence of such troops was necessary to quell the seditions of 
those numerous foreigners and slaves with whom Rome was now 
filled. At a later period a similar class of apologists maintained that 

" The Etrurians had twelve states; Tiberius built twelve villas in Caprae, naming 
them after the twelve greater deities. Tacitus, Annals, iv, 67^ (ed. Murphy). 
'^ Liv., Ill, 55; Dio., VI, 89; vni, 17. 



122 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

the prgetorian guards, being all native Romans of ancient stock," 
worthily represented the Roman nation, and were therefore entitled 
to take part in the choice of its chief magistrate. From taking part, 
to monopolizing the whole, was, as things stood, but a step; and that 
step was taken upon the elevation of Claudius, A. D. 41, who re- 
warded the guards with a liberal donative at the beginning of his 
reign, and thus established a precedent which they took good care 
to afterwards enforce. Henceforth the fortunes of the prsetorian 
prsefects continually rose. From Severus to Diocletian the command 
of the guards, the palace, and the administration of the local laws 
and finances, were entrusted to the prsetorian prsefect. Even the 
provinces and the distant legions felt the influence of this function- 
ary, whose office, during this period, was practically an institution of 
State. The power of the praefect was destroyed at a single stroke 
by Diocletian, who disbanded the guards, while he retained the prae- 
fect merely as a civil officer. The empire, being at that period split 
into four divisions, a viceroy, or "praetorian prefect", was assigned 
to each division. Constantine, though he united the empire, retained 
the four prasfectures and prsefects. They were essentially vassal 
kings, who enjoyed all the prerogatives of royalty. Each one con- 
trolled, within his district, the provincial governors, the army, navy, 
finances, silver coinage, granaries, highways, posts, ports and man- 
ufactures; almost everything except the temples, priesthood, eccle- 
siastical livings, and gold coinage. He could even, if deemed neces- 
sary and justifiable, alter the imperial laws; his tribunal was the last 
court of appeal ; and his sentence was final and absolute. Rome and 
Constantinople were alone exempted from the jurisdiction of a vice- 
roy; each of these great cities having its own urban praefect.'* 

Revenue and Expenditure. The censorial prerogative, which, un- 
der colour of law, Julius usurped and Augustus absorbed into the 
imperial office, namely, to number and enroll, included the right to 
assess the taxes, and it extended, not merely to Italy, but also, by 
means of local censors, to the colonies and free towns, in short, to 
" all the world. " '* But before the gospel of Luke was read in Rome 
these prerogatives had become feudalized and had fallen either into 
the hands of the proconsuls or the bishops. *® 

*^ But this could not have been true, because as Tacitus argues, (Ann., xni, 27,) 
both the sacerdotal orders and the " prsetorian cohorts " were recruited at this period 
with freedmen, of whom the main portion seem to have originally been captives, and 
therefore of foreign birth. '* Code Theod., lib., xiv; Gibbon, 11, 28, 35. 

'* Luke, II, I. '« Guizot, 11. 314. 



OTHER INSTITUTES OF THE SACERDOTAL EMPIRE. 123 

There were originally two treasuries, that of the sovereign-pontiff, 
called the sacred fisc, and that of the people, called the aerarium. The 
former was situated in the imperial palace, the latter in the temple 
of Saturn, at Rome. Before the reign of Caligula the fisc had begun 
to absorb the treasure and revenues of the gerarium. Nero's promise 
to the senate " that the revenues of the prince and the public should 
be kept separate and distinct " " implies a previous breach of this 
regulation. Of subsequent breaches we have numerous instances. 
So long as they were kept distinct, the revenues were ecclesistical, 
imperial and general. The latter were invariably farmed, at first by 
the imperial, afterwards by the proconsular ministers. The farmers, 
publicani, were usually formed into companies, or socii. '** These 
publicani, who were always nobles, usually of the equestrian order, 
were invested with such discretionary powers over the tributaries, 
that the practical result of this mode of collecting the taxes, was that 
the people were oppressed and degraded. In this manner the pub- 
licani contributed to establish some of the most repulsive obligations 
of the feudal system. Payments into the fisc were always due in 
gold coins. " When silver coins were accepted in lieu of gold, it was 
always at the rate of twelve weights of silver for one of gold. ^^ 

The ecclesiastical revenues were derived from the tithes of church- 
lands and from other sources. These tithes were collected from the 
people by the local priests ^^ who, after deducting their own support 
and emolument, paid the residue to the local curate or bishop. After 
paying themselves out of this fund, the bishops deposited the balance 
in the local temples. " The main portion of these revenues were 
received in kind. The portion remitted by the bishops to Rome was 
paid in money. It is not clear whether or not this portion was paid 
into the fisc, in virtue of the emperor's office of pontifex-maximus. 
A portion of the general revenues which went, either directly or by 
commutation, to the aerarium, were also contributed in kind. Thus 
in A. U. 781, Olennius, the Roman governor over the Frisians, hav- 

" Tacitus, Annals, xiii, 4. '^ Cicero, Letters; Tacitus, Annals, xiii, 50. 

'^ M. Lenormant, i, 185, only mentions in this connection the ordinances of Helio- 
gabalus and Alex. Severus. Sozomen, vi, 37, proves it as to military penalties en- 
forced by Valens. See also De Vienne, " Livre d' Argent." 

'"' The error committed by Boeckh and other antiquarians in calculating the ratio 
mentioned in the Theodosian Code, at 14.40, instead of 12, which latter was the cor- 
rect and only ratio in the Roman world for upwards of 1200 years, is dealt with in 
the author's " History of Monetary Systems." De Vienne, 18, gives other ratios, all 
of which are derived from the erroneous one of Bceckh, and must fall with it. 

"^^ Tacitus, Annals, xiv, 31. 22 Tacitus, Historj\ 



124 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED, 

ing exacted the provincial tax in ox-hides of an unusual size, the 
inhabitants revolted and almost cut to pieces the Fifth legion. "Ti- 
berius, with his usual reticence, endeavoured to conceal the loss, . . 
As to the senate, events that happened in the remote frontiers of the 
empire made little impression on that assembly." " Other instances 
of payment in kind are mentioned further on in the present work. 
We are not informed how such payments were covered into the treasu- 
ries, whether by commutation into money, or otherwise. Unless com- 
muted into money, their collection must have given rise to great 
waste, expense and corruption. 

In A. U. 8 II the complaints which reached the sovereign against 
the farmers of the revenue and " the mismanagement that prevailed 
in all departments of the government," were so numerous that Nero, 
at that time an inexperienced youth of twenty, was apprehensive of 
civil war and actually proposed to "abolish the entire system of du- 
ties and taxes." Being reminded that if the government was to be 
supported, this course would be impracticable, he contented himself 
with a decree that "the revenue laws, till that time one of the mys- 
teries of state, should be drawn up in form, and entered on the 
public tables, for the inspection of all degrees and ranks of men. " 
He also exempted the shipping from duties of every kind; thus 
setting the first example of Free Trade to the world. " But these 
reforms, due, no doubt, to the guiding hand of Seneca, came too 
late. The imperial government was no longer capable of reaching 
the people; there were too many vested interests, too many officials 
and too many nobles and ecclesiastics between them. ^® Without a 
total abandonment of the hierarchy, which was now impracticable, 
there was only one future for the empire. It had to continue to be- 
come more and more feudalized, until its distant members dropped off 
from mere political remoteness. 

The revolt of Boadicea, which occurred three years later, is offered 
as a proof that Nero's apprehensions of trouble, arising from the 
the abuses of the fisc, were not groundless. Dion Cassius ascribes 
this event to the rapacity of Seneca, whom Nero, in the warmth of 
youthful generosity, had permitted to enjoy the profits derived from 

^^ Tacitus, Annals, iv, 72-4. A similar remark is repeated in his History, with 
reference to a later reign. ** Tacitus, Annals, xiii 49, 51 

^* Free shipping was the original form of Free Trade. 

^^ Gibbon, chap, xx, has estimated that the churches of the empire at the period of 
Constantine numbered 1800 and the clergy and monks as more numerous than the 
legions. These proportions may safely be carried back to the time of Nero. 



OTHER INSTITUTES OF THE SACERDOTAL EMPIRE. 



125 



farming the revenues of Gaul and Britain. This is a plausible story 
and it may be true; at the same time it must be remembered that 
there is scarcely a line of the mutilated and interpolated fragments 
of literature that have reached us from ancient Rome, but what has 
undergone careful ecclesiastical scrutiny, sometimes from pagan, " 
sometimes from medieval sources, and often from both. This remark 
applies not merely to Dion Cassius, it is probably equally true of the 
writers from whom he drew his materials. "What has been trans- 
mitted to us concerning Tiberius, Caligula, Claudius and Nero, cannot 
be received without great distrust," says Tacitus at the very begin- 
ning of his Annals, while Dion himself makes a similar remark. ^* 
Tacitus gives another reason for the revolt. While admitting that 
the natives were robbed, oppressed, insulted, and their women vio- 
lated by the Roman soldiery, he adds that their religion was trampled 
under foot, and they were required to worship the statue of the sov- 
ereign-pontiff of Rome. ' ' The temple erected to Claudius was another 
cause of discontent. In the eyes of Britons it seemed the fane of 
eternal degradation. The (Roman) priests appointed to officiate at 
the altars, with a pretended zeal for religion, devoured the whole 
substance of the country." " If this be true, there could have been 
nothing left for Seneca; and Boadicea's revolt was Britain's first de- 
fiance of ecclesiastical tyranny. 

Treasure Trove. We learn from the story of Herodes Atticus that, 
in the time of Nerva, the sovereign-pontiff was entitled, by a law or 
custom which is not alludeded to as a novelty, to all treasure trove. 
Reasoning by analogy this prerogative of the crown was included in 
the general constitution established by Augustus, and bore the sacred 
stamp that he affixed to its other articles. Hadrian afterwards made a 
provision which divided treasure trove equally between the right of 
property and that of discovery.'" This does not appear to have been 
intended as the secularization or renunciation, but only the indulgent 
and temporary remission, of a pontifico-imperial prerogative. Prac- 
tically, however, treasure trove, by the time of Constantine, had fall- 

^'' Tacitus himself was a pagan priest and one of the Decemvirs. Annals, xi, 11. 
But he appears to have had little faith in the divinity of emperors. 

^^ "After the battle of Actium, when, to close the scene of civil distraction, all 
power and authority were surrendered to a single ruler . . . what between the parties, 
one paying their court and the other brooding over public injuries, the care of trans- 
mitting proper information to posterity was utterly neglected." Tacitus, History, i, i. 
From the reign of Augustus history becomes less interesting and less authentic. 
Dio., Liv, 16. 

^^ Tacitus, Annals, xiv, 31. so ^jjus Spartianus. 



126 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

en to the proconsuls, praetors, prsefects, or other local lords; and had 
thus become feudalized. 

Mines. Control of the supplies of the material out of which money- 
is to be made is a necessary corollary of the prerogative and the prac- 
tice to create such money and regulate its value, and in all ancient 
states, the two prerogatives will usually be found in the same hands. 
The doctrine of Mines Royal, alluded to in another place, origina- 
ted, not as is commonly supposed, in the ordinances of St. Louis, or 
of Henry III., but in those of Julius Caesar and Augustus. For rea- 
sons which are fully set forth elsewhere, the Roman emperors seem 
to have confined the exercise of their prerogative over mines, to those 
of gold. Mining for this metal was conducted on an extensive scale 
in Egypt, Mauritania, Spain, Gaul, Britain, Upper Germany, and 
other parts of the empire; and the product, whether obtained directly 
by the labour of imperial slaves, or through the imperial praetorian 
praefects, proconsuls, and farmers of the mines, all went into the fisc. 
Even after the right to mine for gold, following other pontifico-impe- 
rial rights, had become feudalized and was actually exercised by pro- 
vincial princes on their own account, the right to coin that metal re- 
mained with the Sacred empire; and for nearly thirteen hundred years 
such right was neither invaded nor questioned, unless by the Goths, 
Arabs, or other heretics. As to silver mines, the imperial govern- 
ment never ventured to strain its always declining authority, by 
claiming either the right to their administration or the monopolization 
of their produce, both of which had long remained in the hands of 
the patrician families of Rome. When in the course of its feudaliza- 
tion, the immediate government of the provinces fell from the sover- 
eign-pontiff to the proconsuls and ecclesiastical legates, "silver" 
(argentum) became in the place of the ancient " nummi " and the 
somewhat later "sesterces", the generic term for "money"." Silver 
mining had therefore practically become the prerogative of the Ro- 
man nobles and, was afterwards transmitted, by the feudal process, 
to those Roman prelates and christianized barbarian princes, who, be- 
tween them, shared the government of the provinces. When, after 

^' Argentum is mentioned as the generic term for money in the province of Spain. 
Livy. XXXIV, 46; xl, 43, et passim. In fact, its use was general throughout the em- 
pire, and it is still used in France, in the form of argent. The English word silver is 
from the Gothic silfer, and finds its anonym in the Scotch iler, the Sclavic silber, as 
well as the Italian piatta, the Spanish plata, and the Portuguese p ata, meaning silver. 
"Plata" is still used as the generic term for money. A " pouno " of argentum in 
the reign of Constantine meant what a " livre d'argent " meant recently in France, 
namely, a sum of money, not a weight of metal. 



OTHER INSTITUTES OF THE SACERDOTAL EMPIRE. 127 

the fall of Constantinople, in 1204, the pontifico-imperial prerogative 
of coining gold fell into the hands of the western princes, they asserted 
practically for the first time in European history, that wider doctrine 
of national Mines Royal which includes both of the precious metals. 

Coinage. The prerogative of coinage is fully treated elsewhere. 
It is only necessary to say here that the authority vested in the Sacred 
emperor gave him entire control over the coinage of the empire, with 
power to confer coining privileges on the provinces, cities, and sub- 
sidiary kings, nobles and princes, and to fabricate money out of such 
materials and to confer upon it such denominations or legaf value and 
functions, as he deemed proper. In confirming to the patrician fami- 
lies their ancient right to coin silver, and to the senate its ancient priv- 
ilege to issue the copper coinage, which was done by Augustus, the 
emperor did not necessarily surrender his prerogative over those por- 
tions of the coinage. Yet, as he did not usually choose to exercise 
this right, or, as in coining silver, like Augustus, or bronze, like 
Caligula, he merely shared these functions with others, he may, in 
strictness be held to have waived or surrendered his prerogative as to 
both of these last-named metals. This was an error of policy suffi- 
cient in time to have involved the state in great difficulties. Such is 
the nature of money that lawful permission to create and circulate one 
kind of money substantially equals permission to create all kinds 
of money; and such a power, when permitted to slip from the con- 
trol of the state, is enough to eventually break down any system of 
exchange, and with it any social system, which stands above the level 
of barter and savagery. However, forces far more active, if not 
more powerful, than this one, were hurrying the empire toward disso- 
lution; and it is useless to speculate upon the operation, by itself, of 
this defective principle in the Sacred constitution.^^ 

Legal Tender. The axiom preserved by Julius Paulus (third century) 
that "money was whatever the state made money", was a constitu- 
tional principle of the Roman state when that state was governed by 
free institutes. Of what the lawful money of the state consisted at 

^^ Notwithstanding the absolute power granted to Augustus, it must not be forgotten 
that his elevation followed closely upon the overthrow of republican institutions and 
that, even had he desired, he would hardly have dared, to deprive the patricians of any 
of their acquired privileges, whether of patronage, mining, or coining. We have 
silver coins of nearly all the emperors, but whether they were coined by them or by 
the patricians under their authority, or partly by both, is not always certain. How- 
ever, we do know that Titus Antistius, qunsstor at Apollonia in Thrace, was compelled 
to coin silver for Pompey, (Cicero, ad Lucius Plancus A. U. 707,) and that Vespasian 
coined silver at Antioch. Tacitus, Histor}'. 



128 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

Other times, is a difficult problem, which the author has endeavoured 
to elucidate in other works, and to these the reader is referred, who 
desires more definite information on the subject. Substantially, the 
money of Rome at the period of the Gaulish Invasion, consisted of 
overvalued bronze counters, whose artificial value was sustained by 
the legal and practical limitations of their total number. Hence, they 
were called nummi. This limitation was legally fixed by the senate, 
and the counters were practically guarded against falsification by 
means of their artistic beauty and excellence; a device which ren- 
dered them difficult or impossible to counterfeit. During the Punic 
wars, silver, and afterwards gold coins, were added to the system. 
After the conquest of Spain the gentes were permitted to strike and 
issue silver coins. These additions destroyed the integrity of the 
nummulary system ; and although Augustus pretended, in part, to re- 
store it, this was never done. Overvalued bronze sesterces, issued by 
the senate, furnished the small change of the Roman monetary system 
during the early empire; but these were supplemented by imperial 
silver and silver-plated and pontifical gold coins. As the empire be- 
came feudalized, the bronze sesterces, though their issue continued, 
were altogether superceded, as legal tender, by silver denarii and by 
the gold solidi or besants of the Sacred emperors; 240 of the for- 
mer, or five of the latter, making the imaginary "libra", or "pound", 
of money (argentum) of the dark ages.^* 

Lands, Wills and Conveyances. As the institutes of Rome gradu- 
ally became feudalized, the right to convey or devise their property 
in lands, to whomsoever they pleased, which its citizens once pos- 
sessed, was gradually lost. Had it continued, the military service or 
other personal obligation, which the citizen owed not to the state, but 
to a dominus, or suzerain, who stood between himself and the state, 
might have been defeated, by means of a sale or bequest. With the 
loss of ability to convey or devise lands, the public land-registries, 
established under the Commonwealth, fell into disuse, and the office 
of agrimensor became a sinecure. We shall see the right to convey 
and devise lands revived, when, in after times, the feudal system fell 
away, and freeholds were restored. As for land-registries, they are 
not yet reestablished in any of those countries which retain any im- 
portant remains of the feudal system.^' 

Titles of Nobility. Some allusions have already been made to this 

"^ Code Theodosius ; Del Mar's " Monetary Systems," chapter on " Rome." 
^* Two centuries ago Andrew Yarranton spent his life in the vain endeavour to trans- 
plant this and other institutes of republican states into the then, feudal soil of England. 



OTHER INSTITUTES OF THE SACERDOTAL EMPIRE. 129 

subject. The Brahmins divided all men into nine varnas or castes, 
corresponding in number to the days of the week. Wherever their 
religion was carried, for example, into China, Persia, Assyria, Egypt, 
Greece, Etruria, Gaul, etc., similar castes were established. The de- 
sign of Buddhism was to sweep away castes entirely, but this design 
was not accomplished. In all the states where Buddhism was engraft- 
ed upon Brahminical stock, caste will still be found, often modified, 
but nowhere wholly extinguished. The date of the modification in each 
state appears to have followed the adoption of a year of twelve months. 
For example, Hoang-ti divided the Chinese year into twelvemonths, 
and although his son, Chao-hao, affirmed the ancient institute of nine 
castes, this was afterwards abolished. ^* In Etruria (the pagan Roman 
ecclesiastical legends call it "Rome") the case was analogous. 
" Numa" ran with Buddha'" in dividing the year into twelve months, 
whilst he held with Brahma in grading humanity into a number of 
castes, which began at the top with priests and nobles, and ended at 
the bottom with artisans and slaves. The Commonwealth substan- 
tially abolished caste; and for a long period the Roman state exhibit- 
ed the peculiar institution (adverted to elsewhere) of a priesthood 
drawn from all classes of the people. But caste is a weed that cannot 
be destroyed by mere force of law, whether such law be civil or eccle- 
siastical. It will only die when human weakness and ignorance ceases 
to afford it nourishment. 

No sooner did Caesar establish the hierarchy, than the ancient insti- 
tution of caste, which during the Commonwealth had been suppressed 
but not extirpated, sprang up again, this time commencing with the 
army and the court. The seven grades of caste established or per- 
petuated by Servius Tullius had perished, but the roots of patrician 
plebian and slave were still in the ground. " The civil wars had added 
tribunes and equites and the Triumvirate had contributed the grades 
of Prince of the Senate, Count and Reverend. '' New civil grades 
(if the term civil be admissible in a hierarchy) were now to be inter- 

^* The Chinese assign Hoang-ti to a remote age; but he is plainly a product of 
Buddhism. See " The Worship of Augustus Csesar," p. 80. 

^^ The legend runs that Numa was the son-in-law of Tat-Ius, whose reign over 
Rome commenced in B. C. 747, But Tat and lus, or les, are names of Buddha and 
the year mentioned was that of the incarnation of Nabon-Issus in the Assyrian myth- 
ology. 

^^ A similar preservation of ancient caste is to be observed in the French republic 
of to-day, and may play an important part in the future history of that state. 

^^ Cicero calls himself bishop, (episcopus,) of the diocese, (dioecesis,) of the Cam- 
panian Coast. Att., v, 21; vii, 11. 



130 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

posed between the Sacred sovereign and the people, such as Augus- 
tus, Caesar, Princeps, Rex, and Comes Palatini; and new military 
grades were to be manufactured for the officers in control of the prov- 
inces, such as procurator, dux, exarch, ethnarch, tetrarch, etc. Au- 
gustus clothed the Roman knights, who ruled the province of Egypt, 
with the judicial power of Roman magistrates. '' Allusion has else- 
where been made to the three grades of counts erected by Tiberius. 
The favorite political maxim of Claudius was that the judicial sen- 
tences of the imperial procurators, ought to be in their several prov- 
inces, of as high authority/ as if they had been pronounced by him- 
self." An edict of Nero refers to "all degrees and ranks of men".*' 
The titles of Consul, Proconsul, and Prince of the Roman Youth, 
were conferred by the senate upon Nero before he became of age." 
Justin Martyr, A, D. 141, addressed himself to the " Sacred Senate. " 
Society was beginning to arrange itself into those numerous degrees 
of feudal subordination which are the inevitable fruit of hierarchical 
government. To detail this dismemberment, to endeavour to settle 
the precise relation of ranks, between which there was as yet no pre- 
cise relation, would be the work of a pedant. The tendency of the 
atoms of a society governed by superstition, is to fly apart; the ten- 
dency of such atoms, when governed by reason, is to combine togeth- 
er. It is not at the beginning of such processes that any natural order 
is to be observed. There is order; but nobody sees and nobody re- 
cords it. Presently the order is perceived, then all men hasten to 
conform to it; they record its movement; and even ascribe to it a 
miraculous origin; whereas, if they only threw a handful of sand into 
the air, and observed its fall, they would perceive a similar order, 
wherein the lightest particles remain behind," Yet, all this time the 

^' Tacitus, Annals, xii, 60. *" Ibid. 

■*' Ibid, XIII. "2 Ibid, xii, 41. 

*^ Tacitus calls these lighter particles the " thin nobility." Annals, xiii, 8. Manil- 
ius sings in a similar strain: 

Utque per ingentes populus describitur urbes 

Prseciquumque patres retinent, et proximum equester 

Ordo locum, populuraque equiti, populoque subire 

Vulgus iners videas et jam sine nomine turbam; 

Sic etiam in magno quaedam respublica mundo est, 

Quam natura facit quae coelo condidit urbem. 

Astronoraicon, Lib., v, 1. 730-5. 

And as in cities where, in ranks decreed, 

First Nobles go, and then the Knights succeed. 

The next in order may the People claim; 

The Rabble next, a crown without a name; 

So are the Heavens by different ranks possessed. 

Creech's Trans. 



OTHER INSTITUTES OF THE SACERDOTAL EMPIRE. 131 

very source of these honours and titles of nobility, the pontificate it- 
self, was substantially unaffected by the new movement. The equality 
of the priesthood, established under the Commonwealth, remained as 
yet unchanged. Some of the priesthood, like the Luperci, were re- 
cruited from the most ancient or aristocratic families of Rome; oth- 
ers were plebians, freedmen, and even slaves. Like the army and 
court, the priesthood was ultimately destined to adopt the institute of 
caste, and to rejoice in its legates, cardinals, prelates,^ etc., but not 
yet. There was another peculiarity about the Roman ndbility. 'With 
other nations, caste was hereditary; with the Romans it was 'de'ter- 
mined by appointment ; and this appointment, whether it was that of a 
duke, count, bishop, praefect, centurion, or petty priest, proceeded in 
the first instance from the infallible sovereign-pontiff, who through- 
out the empire was the fountain of both military, civic and ecclesi- 
astic rank."** 

Dux or leader, appears to have been the title of a military sergeant, 
dux turmse, or commander of three decuries, 30 men. It was after- 
wards applied to the primipilus or senior captain, or centurion, of a 
legion. This officer had the care of the eagle, or chief standard, and 
ranked next below the staff. He was also called primus centurio, 
prsefectus legionis, and dux legionis. The position was not only hon- 
ourable, but profitable. " Smash the tents of the Moors and the cas- 
tles of the Brigantes", scoffs the satirist, " that by the age of sixty you 
may rise to the fat post of a standard-bearer "." Such was the origin 
of a duke's title. The important commands afterwards entrusted to 
the subordinate officers of the praetorian guard increased its impor- 
tance, until at length it was adopted by the provincial commanders 
and proconsuls; a circumstance plainly proved by the title limitaneis 
ducibus'*" and the expression ludere ducatus et imperia. *' 

Claudius made the proconsuls supreme in their respective prov- 
inces, though subject and accountable to Rome, and it may have 
been the better to insure this accountability, that the ducal dignity 
was kept under control of the supreme-pontiff. Upon the feudaliza- 
tion of the empire, the title of dux was retained by those command- 
ers who succeeded to the government of the great fiefs into which it 
had become divided. Hence, after the Roman official adoption of 
Christianity, it became associated with the idea of local sovereign 

** M, Guizot (i, 93,) argues from the celibacy of the Catholic priesthood that the 
church cannot be charged with having supported a system of (hereditary) caste, but he 
does not say that it did not support a system of appointed caste. 

■** Juvenal, xiv, 196. ""^ Lampridinus, Alex. Sev., 17. 4'' Suetonius. Nero, 35. 



132 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

power; yet, like the ducal titles of Romulus, Gratian, Theodosian, 
Alaric and Attila, in the fourth century, of Clovis in the fifth, of Ben- 
eventoand Spoleto in the sixth, and of Venice, in the seventh, it was 
a mark of sovereignty which was bestowed by — and whose acceptance 
therefore acknowledged the supremacy of — the sovereign-pontiff. In 
short, a duke at this asra was a feudal sovereign, really or nominally 
subject to the sovereign-pontiff, sometimes really subject in certain 
respects and only nominally in others. It is a fact, whose significance 
will be pointed out in another place, that dukes were never attempted 
to be created by the northern or western kings until after the fall of 
Constantinople. The earliest of such creations in England was by 
Edward III. With the Reformation and the decline of the feudal 
system the title lost both the meaning and authority which it had 
once acquired. 

Comes, a companion, appears to have been a title bestowed origin- 
ally upon those youths of the patrician or equestrian orders, contu- 
bernales, whom it was the custom to send to the provinces with the 
proconsuls, to guard and attend them and incidentally to learn the 
art of war, of farming the revenues, and of profitably investing money 
in the securities of provincial cities. " When Julius Caesar left the 
proconsulship of Gaul to hew his way to that sacred throne which he 
designed to erect upon the ruined liberties of his country, he probably 
incited his comites with the hope of sharing the profits and glory of 
his elevation. At all events, after his deification^ he appointed twelve 
Counts of the Palace to attend his person and guard his throne. *° 
His friend Junius Brutus, he who afterward betrayed and stabbed 
him to death, was probably one of the twelve. This tragedy threw 
a cloud upon the title of count, which was never afterwards removed. 
Although its origin was regarded as more honourable than that of 
duke, the latter was destined to pass it in the race of glory. The 
Companions or body-guard of Alexander are frequently mentioned by 
Quintus Curtius and other historians. During the Commonwealth of 
Rome the body-guard of the consuls consisted of twelve lictors, a sort 
of policemen. When the hierarchy was established, the sovereign- 
pontiff constituted his body-guard exclusively of nobles — "all hon- 
ourable men." Yet even that precaution failed to preserve his life. 

Tiberius created three classes of counts. ^" Constantine created 
counts of the boundaries, or marks, the origin of the later titles of 

^^ Cic, Verr., 11, 10; also in his Letters. 

*' The 300 celeres or body-guard of Romulus are alluded to elsewhere. 

^° Selden, Titles of Honour, 296, 



OTHER INSTITUTES OF THE SACERDOTAL EMPIRE. 133 

marquis, margrave, etc., and it may have also been Constantine who 
[rendered a count and a bishop of equal rank. It was probably in the 
reign of Theodosius, whose father had been a duke, that this title 
was established as superior to count. This was done, not by degrading 
the counts, but by promoting the dukes. Claudius had made the 
latter supreme in their provinces, but subject to Rome. Theodosius 
and the feudal circumstances of the time, not only recognized them 
as supreme in their provinces, but also in some respects independent 
of Rome. The counts did not share this elevation and so they rela- 
tively lost caste. The subordination of duke (sometimes called rex 
or king) to emperor, and of count to duke, is distinctively shown in 
Gregory of Tours, the Chronicle of Fredegarius, the Annals of Metz 
and other medieval texts. The coordination of count and bishop 
appears in the capitulary of Charles the Bald, 876, in synodo pon- 
tigonensi. The higher nobility were appointed by the sovereign- 
pontiff. This included the ranks of Augustus, Caesar, Princeps, Rex, 
Exarch, Dux, Comes and others. With regard to the inferior titles 
of nobility they were probably granted by proxy. 

Slavery. Under the constitution of the hierarchy there were four 
principal degrees of slavery, of which theservus, adiscriptum glebula, 
colonus and nexus, were the respective embodiments. I. — The servus 
was, legally speaking, not a person,but only a chattel. Hemight besold 
at pleasure, imprisoned, chained, scourged, branded, tortured, or even 
put to death by his master. This class was composed chiefly of 
prisoners of war, who had refused to surrender. The most contu- 
macious were condemned to the mines. " The trade in slaves was 
conducted chiefly by dealers, who followed the armies an<l purchased 
from the soldiers, often for a weight of silver equal to that contained 
in three or four shillings, say a dollar, each, prisoners who usually 
fetched an hundred times as much in Rome. "* Freedmen who had 
proved ungrateful or insolent to their patrons could be again con- 
demned to slavery. This infamous law created a body of vassals 
owing fealty to a dominus, who though he had ceased to be an owner, 
could yet become a tyrant. On this account both Augustus and 
Tiberius refused to permit the word dominus to appear in their titles. 
Nevertheless the people insisted in conferring it upon the former. ^^ 
The law which condemned an ungrateful freedman to vassalage must 
have been repealed after the reign of Claudius, " for in that of N"ero 

^' "Do not the mines continually groan with the load of heathens?" Tertullian, 
ApoL, A. D. 198. *■' .See an instance of the sale of prisoners in Tacitus, Hist, 

5* Suet., Aug., 53 and Tib., 27. " Suet., Claud,, 25. 



134 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

complaints were made to the senate concerning the growing insolence 
of this class towards their former owners. It was proposed to reenact 
the old law, so that a patron might reclaim his right over such as 
made an improper use of their liberty; but Nero, to his credit, refused 
assent to the atrocious scheme and it was dropped. " However, it 
appears to have been reenacted under emperors who were at least 
nominally Christians. ^^ II. — The adiscriptum glebula was a bonds- 
man fixed to the soil, and paying rent or service to the landowner. In 
one letter, ix, 15, Pliny the Younger complains of being " interrupted 
with the importunate complaints and petitions of my farm-tenants; " 
in another, x, 11, he says that "the badness of the season for sev- 
eral years past obliges me to think of making some abatement in my 
rents." These letters, as well as ix, 20, and others, are those of a 
feudal lord, controlling a great number of vassals fixed to the soil, 
who were dependent for justice solely upon his personal clemency. 
The great mass of ecclesiastical slaves both under pagan and Christian 
rule were of this class. " III. — The colonus was not a slave, but a 
member of an agricultural colony of Roman freemen, commonly of 
soldiers, who had served out the usual term in the army, or of bar- 
barians, colonized under Roman laws. Yet, as such colonies were all 
organized under the protection of Roman patrons, who were able to 
demand military or other services from them " and as owing to the 
continual increase of new intermediate offices and social castes in 
Rome, their relation to the Roman state became more and more re- 
mote, until it was scarcely to be discerned at all, the colonus was 
eventually reduced to a condition of vassalage that differed but 
slightly from that of the adiscriptum glebula. IV.— The nexus was 
a citizen compelled to work out a debt or ransom! In a certain sense, 
children, and grandchildren were slaves to the paternal ancestor. 
Tacitus complains of the Jewish religion that it did not permit a 
father to lawfully kill his own child. ^^ In the reign of Anastasius 
(491-5 18) it was provided that the simple rescript of the emperor was 
sufficient to confer freedom upon a son or a slave, without consent of 
father or owner. The ecclesiastical organization acquired great 
strength both of numbers and zeal by admitting some of the slaves 

" Tacitus, Annals, xiii, 16. 

*^ Libertum qui probatus fuerit patrono delatores summississe qui de statu ejas 
facerent ei qusestionem servum patroni esse jussit. Justinian's Digest, lib. v, de jure 
Patron. 

*'' Pliny himself was an ecclesiastic and of high rank. Letters, x, 13. 

*^ Ulpian, de Servitutes. ^^ Tacitus, History. 



OTHER INSTITUTES OF THE SACERDOTAL EMPIRE. 135 

into the monastic and priestly orders. Contrariwise, no slave could 
enter the military service until he had been lawfully emancipated. 
Out of these institutes were yet to grow very important consequences. 

The Provinces. Conquered countries were permitted to be gov- 
erned either by vassal kings, administering local laws, as in Egypt, 
Galatia, Cyprus, Syria, (including Judea,) Greece, Parthia, etc., or by 
rulers — proconsuls or praetors — appointed from Rome. In the latter 
case such countries were governed by Roman laws, either hierarch- 
ical, or proconsular, or both. Provinces were otherwise divided into 
two classes, imperial and senatorial; the former being directly under 
control of the sovereign-pontiff, as Syria when it became a province, 
all of Egypt, all, except the southern portion (Boetica) of the Spanish 
Peninsula, all of Gaul, (including Britain,) all of Germany, (including 
part of Saxony,) and some others. Twenty odd legions of Roman 
troops were employed to enforce these regulations. Under Augustus, 
the proconsuls exercised only a civil authority, the army being sub- 
ject to direct imperial control ; under Claudius, as before mentioned, 
the proconsuls were also clothed with military power. 

The lands of the provinces either by consecration, testament, taxa- 
tion, donation, or purchase, fell chiefly into the hands of two classes, 
the Roman patricians and the Roman (pagan) ecclesiastics. In many 
of the provinces a portion of the lands were allotted to Roman citi- 
zens or soldiers for past services upon emphyteutical or other con- 
ditional tenures. This practice was as old as Sylla. After him Julius 
Caesar, Augustus and other sovereign-pontiffs allotted lands to their 
soldiers, either for past or future services. ^° Another class of bene- 
ficiaries, vectigales, were permitted to acquire or retain lands in the 
provinces upon a tenure of future military service, or upon condition 
of paying a portion of the produce for rent, census soli, to the pro- 
consul or propraetor. "' Such rent was paid variously in corn, cattle, 
hides, forage, horses, wood, e:c. "^ 

As soon as a newly acquired province became Romanized it was 
obliged to furnish soldiers for the legions, a provision from which 
Italy was exempt. In order to practically disseminate the Roman 
language, customs, and religion, the legions recruited in the older 
provinces were shifted into the newer ones, a system of transplant- 
ing which was afterwards followed by Charlemagne, in Saxony, Frisia, 
Hungary, etc. The provincials had no right to vote and could not 

^" Suet., C^s., 18, 22, 25, 26, 28, 47, 50, 54; Tacitus, History. 
*' Cicero, CtEcilius, n, 10; de provs. cons., 5. 



62 



Vopiscus, in Prob., 15; Tacitus, Annals, iv, 72-4; Cic, Phil., n, 25. 



136 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED, 

hold ofifice. This provision was overthrown when Nero granted the 
rights of Roman citizens to the free inhabitants of Greece, Galbato 
those of the two Gauls, and Caracalla to all the free inhabitants of 
the empire. The consul or praetor in command of a province was 
called proconsul or propraetor; at a later period, dux or rex. The 
rapacity of these officers is attested by Cicero, Tacitus and Juvenal. 

Free Cities. Cities, either in Italy or the provinces, whose inhabi- 
tants had been made Roman citizens, were called municipia. Citi- 
zenship included the rights of liberty, of freely removing from place 
to place, of property, inheritance, worship, voting, holding office, 
whether civil or ecclesiastical, disposing of property by testament, 
and others." The inhabitants of some cities were accorded all the 
rights of citizenship, except such as could not be enjoyed unless they 
resided at Rome. Other cities possessed only a portion of these rights ; 
a few like, Nemausus (Nismes) in Gaul, exercised peculiar rights. 
The municipia were at liberty to enact their own municipal laws. 
Anciently there were no free cities except in Italy; afterwards they 
became numerous, many of them purchasing their charters from the 
sovereign-pontiff. Pliny mentions eight free cities in Bcetica alone, 
and 13 others in Hither Spain." Indeed they were scattered all over 
the empire, and to some extent were conservators of the ancient in- 
stitutes of liberty. 

Fairs, ferine, were days of rest, sacred-days, wake-days, fete-days 
or holidays." Every ninth day or nundine, was a feriae or fair-day, 
upon which no business, except such as the pontificate prescribed, 
could lawfully be transacted. °' As on the nundine, the peasants re- 
sorted to the cities to celebrate, in the temples, the festivals of ab- 
stention from labor and to see the shows, it became a practice, which 
the pagan church licensed, and from which it derived an income, for 
the citizens to sell wares to, and purchase produce from the peas- 
antry in the open spaces, near the temples. Such fairs are mentioned 
by Celsus in the second century, as reported by Origen in the third, 
by the writers of the Constantine period, by Zosimus, a Greek histo- 
rian of the Theodosian aera, and in the Digest of Justinian. " With ref- 

^^ The pontificate practically destroyed the privilege of citizens to fill the ecclesias- 
tical offices, by extending it to slaves. For nearly a thousand years it withheld from 
citizens the right to dispose of property by testament. 

^* Nat. Hist., Ill, 8, *^ Ferias ac jocos celebrare., Liv., I, 4. 

^^ Laws of the Twelve Tables, table in; Michelet, p. 444; andLivy, ill, 35andvii,i5. 

" Digest, lib., xi, i. In other parts of this work the reader is furnished with ample 
evidences of the fact that not only the Romans, but many other nations also, kept the 
ninth day. He will only be detained here with an additional example of the theory 



OTHER INSTITUTES OF THE SACERDOTAL EMPIRE. 137 

erence to the custom of holding fairs within the precincts of churches, 
this was common, both to Brahminical India, Assyria and Rome, and 
afterwards at Mecca. So late as A. D. looi, the emperor Otto granted 
in fee to the church of St. Cameracensis in Castellum Santa Maria, 
the right to build, establish and conduct within its precincts a mar- 
ket and money exchange (tabula nummularia) together with a toll- 
booth (telloneum) and corn-mill (bannum), "in such away that no 
duke, marquis, count, or other person shall have any power over the 
same ". After having obtained these rights from the emperor, the 
managers of this church cunningly obtained from other sources what 
they claimed was a right to coin money; so that, combining these va- 
rious functions together, they drove a very lucrative business."* 

After the Roman week had been changed by the Christians to seven 
days, fairs, with the usual shows and sales of wares, were held on the 
seventh, instead of the ninth day, on Sundays instead of Nundinae. 
They were conducted in the open spaces near the Christian churches, 
which, like their pagan predecessors, granted indulgence to such fairs, 
opened them with prayers and invocations, and received from them 
a profit. This fact is made a source of complaint by St. Basil, fourth 
century, and is attested among other evidences by the German name 
for fair, which is messe, or mass, both having been conducted on the 
same day and under ecclesiastical auspices. Indeed, Sunday fairs, 
within the grounds of temples and churches, are still held in many 
parts pf Europe. The English name for fairs, namely wakes, or weeks, 
proves the nundinal and ecclesiastical origin, because they bore this 
name before the week was altered by the church to seven days. 

Besides weekly fairs, there were others at longer intervals, com- 
monly once a year, called great fairs. An annual fair held at Cre- 
mona, A. D. 69, was the temptation which induced the troops of Ves- 
pasian to sack and destroy that city."" A fair was held at Lyons, on 
the Rhone, in the reign of Marcus Aurelius.'" About A. D. 365, Ab- 
dallah, with 500 horsemen, captured the fair of Abilah in Upper Syria. 

that in order to make good the myths which they found it necessary to accept from 
the eastern provinces of the empire, the Roman priests falsified all history and that 
modern historians have carelessly accepted this falsification as true. Carr, Rom. Ant., 
368, citing Carl Otfried Miiller, Die Etrusker (1828) 11, 324 and Ideler, Handbuch, 11, 
63, etc., alludes to the nundine as "an eight-day week of very ancient institution," 
whilst others, with equal assurance, backed, as in this instance, by very unsatisfactory 
evidence, continue to proclaim that the Roman week was always of seven days. How- 
ever, this does not make it so. The evidences prove that it was in fact nine days, 

^^ Du Cange, Moneta tabula nummularia, et Moneta baronia. 

^^ Tacitus, History, in, 32. " Eusebius, v, i. 



138 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

In the narrative of the embassy of Theodosius II. , to Attila, the Hun, 
we read of a great fair on the Danube in the year 449. At these fairs 
slaves were often sold, and this, both before and after the adoption 
of Christianity. In virtue of his office of pontifex-maximus the sov- 
ereign-pontiff had the right to establish or prohibit markets and fairs, 
and to lease and farm their revenues; privileges whose exercise seri- 
ously affected the prosperity of the places in which they were held. 
Thus, in the narrative above cited, Attila demanded of the emperor 
that the great fair held on the Danube should be removed toNaissus, 
a town in Attila's fief, distant five days journey southwest from the 
river. Great fairs were established not so much to exhibit the excel- 
lence of wares, products and chattels, as to sell or exchange them for 
others. For this reason, during the medieval ages, when money was 
scarce, they assumed great economical importance. Ordinary pur- 
chase and sale, without "permutation", had become difficult. The 
latter was a system of clearings or off-setting of accounts, which could 
only be practiced at fairs, and which, while it substantially avoided 
the inconvenience of barter, dispensed to a certain extent with the 
use of money. 

Great fairs are of much higher antiquity than Rome. They orig- 
inated in India with the Sacred fair of the tenth, now the twelfth year, 
when the sun completed the zodiacal circle, anciently of ten, now of 
twelve, subdivisions. They formed a portion of the ceremonial be- 
longing to the Sun-worship, and were afterwards, successively appro- 
priated by the Brahmins, Buddhists, Magians, the Greek and Roman 
polytheists, as well as by the worshippers of Augustus, Dionysius 
and Christ. In all these religions the ecclesiastical establishment re- 
ceived or shared the profits of the fairs, and in India they do so to the 
present time. At Hurdwar, on the Ganges, is a sacred pool, which is 
visited annually by large numbers of pious Hindus, who come from 
all parts of Hindustan to be baptised in the holy river, at the vernal 
equinox, when the Sun enters Aries, a period corresponding to our 
Easter. This ceremony of baptism is performed while a great fair is 
held in the vicinity. Every twelfth year, when Jupiter enters Aquarius, 
while the Sun is in Aries, the great fair becomes one of special sanc- 
tity. This is called the Kunibh Fair." 

Rights of War, Peace and Treaties. The prerogatives of declaring" 

'^ From a Minute of the Provincial government of Allabahad, alluded to in the Lon- 
don Times of February 3rd, 1892. The attendance at the Kumbh Fair in 1867 was 
1,250,000 persons; 1879, 600,000; 1891, on the baptising day, something under half a 
million. 



OTHER INSTITUTES OF THE SACERDOTAL EMPIRE. 139 

and making war and peace and treaties, anciently exercised by the 
senate, were all absorbed by the sovereign-pontiff upon the estab- 
lishment of the Sacred constitution, and were exercised in virtue of 
his sacred office. All wars and treaties were sanctified by religious 
rites. The ordinary flag of truce was an exhibition of sacerdotal vest- 
ments, which, as now, were always made of white-linen; hence, the 
white flag, which is still in use, is an ecclesiastical token." 

Calendar. The emperor being also the pontifex-maximushad the 
right to fix, regulate and alter the sera and calendar. This right was 
exercised by Julius Cassar, Augustus, Claudius, Nero, Diocletian and 
others. The subject is treated at great length in the author's work 
on " The Worship of Augustus Csesar. " 

Foreign Ambassadors. Under the Commonwealth, the senate nom- 
inated out of its own body all ambassadors sent from Rome, and re- 
served to itself the right to deal with foreign states and to treat with 
foreign ambassadors." These rights, or the Jus Legationis were af- 
terwards absorbed by the sovereign-pontiff; and during the empire 
the appointment of Roman legates to treat with foreign states, and 
the reception of legates from foreign states, became sacerdotal func- 
tions. 

Corporations. The creation and endowment of these artificial bodies 
was always an ecclesiastical function. It probably grew out of the 
ecclesiastical power over public assemblages. ■"* From the earliest 
ages of Rome its cities acted in a corporate capacity and possessed 
rights, owned lands, borrowed money, and exercised other functions, 
in community. " Their boundaries were laid out and their communal 
functions were bestowed by the priesthood. Beside inunicipal cor- 
porations, the Romans had several other classes, as sacerdotal, cere- 
monial, charitable, professional, commercial, industrial, etc. These 
were designated by the general name of collegia, socii, or sodalitiis. 
The Sacred college, the Fratresambarvales, the Luperci, the Curetes 
who carried in procession the image of Bona Dea, and were privi- 
leged to solicit alms, '" are examples of sacerdotal corporations; the 
College of Heralds " was ceremonial; the Society of Am-Issus, in 

" Tacitus, History, i, 61; Livy, xxiv, 30. 

" Livy, II. 15; XXX, 26; XLiii, ig, etc.; Livy, vi 26; vii, 20; xxx, 17; Cic, Vat., 
15; Dom., 9. 

'■* Trade-guilds were established by the Brahmins of India. Each guild (ras) was 
bound together by religious rites and had its own pontifex. Higgins, Anacal., 11, 297. 
The hans or hongs of China were somewhat of the same character. 

" Cicero's Letters. ""^ Cic, de Legg., 11, g, 16. 

" Livy, XXXVI, 3. 



140 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

Pontus, was one of charity; " the College of Praetors " the Scribse, 
and the Fire Brigades/" were professional; the Farmers of the reve- 
nue and the colleges of Merchants were commercial ; while the Navicu- 
larii of Alexandria, the Nautse of Paris, etc., were industrial. " The 
first industrial corporations or trade-guilds are attributed to the time 
of " Numa. " About the middle of the fifth century of Rome, when 
the people obtained control of the Sacred college, all commercial cor- 
porations, new or old, were abolished, ^^ and for more than two 
centuries the Commonwealth was left to develope its resources with- 
out the assistance of such fraternities. In A. U. 695, that restless 
intriguant, P. Clodius, procured the reinstatement of collegia and 
increased their number, many of these being probably political 
clubs; for some of them admitted slaves and the very dregs of the 
populace. *^ When Julius Csesar became sovereign-pontiff these clubs 
were suppressed; and the only corporations permitted to assemble 
were the sacerdotal, ceremonial, and official colleges, and the trade- 
guilds of ancient date. " All these, as before, were subject to the 
Sacred college, which could extend at pleasure, enlarge, or limit 
their powers, or destroy them altogether. ^* 

Navigation Laws. The Roman laws forbade the carrying of mer- 
chandise between Roman ports in any but Roman bottoms; and 
except during those portions of the dark and medieval ages when the 
Gothic princes of Saxony, "Frankland" and Britain, and the Moslem 
princes of Asia, Africa and Andaluz acted independently of the empire, 
these laws were rigidly enforced and faithfully observed. After the 
fall of the empire, the enforcement of the navigation laws in western 
Europe fell into the hands of the Western kings. 

Public Notaries. During the Commonwealth, scribse, or public 
notaries, in bodies of ten, or decuries, were employed to record the 
transactions of the senate, the courts of justice, and other public 

18 "Writing from Pontus to the sovereign-pontiff at Rome Pliny uses the following 
language: " If the prayer of the Am-Iseni, which you refer to me, concerning the es- 
tablishment of a charitable society, be agreeable to their own laws, which by the Articles 
of Alliance Jt is stipulated they shall enjoy, I should not oppose it, especially if these 
contributions are employed not for the purpose of riot and faction, but for the support 
of the indigent. In other cities, however, those which are subject to our laws, I would 
have all communities of this nature prohibited." Ep., x, 94. This policy extinguished 
the right of assemblage. 

" Cic. Off., in, 20. »» Pliny, Ep., x, 42. 

**' " A college of merchants " is mentioned in Livy, 11, 27. 

*^ Livy, x; Cic, Piso, iv. *^ Cic, Piso, iv. 

** "Cuncta collegia praetor antiquitus constituta distraxit." Suet., Jul.. 42. 

*^ For trade-guilds in Great Britain, see Palgrave, r, 349. 



OTHER INSTITUTES OF THE SACERDOTAI, EMPIRE. 141 

bodies, to register births, marriages, divorces, adoptions and deaths, 
also deeds of conveyance and other documents. They also performed 
some of the functions of the modern solicitor or conveyancer. The 
scribae of this period were slaves or freedmen; and it was not until 
the brave exploits of Caius Flavins, A. U. 449, that the order re- 
ceived any decided accession of dignity. " After the epoch of Sylla, 
the scribje were organized into a college, to which none but free- 
born citizens were admitted, and at this period, they are alluded to 
with great respect by Cicero. " Under the empire, many of their 
functions, including the registration of wills, testaments, convey- 
ances, births, marriages and deaths, etc., fell into the hands of the 
church; and the creation of scribae became a prerogative of the sov- 
ereign-pontiff and was exercised on his behalf by some high official 
of the hierarchy, who not only appointed the notaries of Rome, but 
also those of the provinces, however remote. Both Claudius and 
Domitian enforced the Clodian law which inhibited notaries of the 
treasury from the pursuit of traffic. " 

Weights and Measures. Lanciani, pp. 39, 41, upon the evidences 
afforded by the archaeological remains of Rome, lays it down in sub- 
stance that the pontiff-maximus had charge of the standards of the 
imperial weights and measures and alone had the right to regulate 
them. From this it would follow that only the weights and measures 
prescribed at Rome could lawfully be employed in the provinces, no 
matter how distant they might be from the capital. 

Here must end our examination of the Roman hierarchical Con- 
stitution. For the purpose of this work it is not necessary to proceed 
any farther. The difficulty of tracing its outlines is not altogether 
due to the destruction or mutilation of classical literature. It is due 
also to the introduccion of the pagan, and afterwards the Christian, 
ecclesiastical literatures. More than all, it is due to the ill-defined 
and shifting character of the constitution itself, which, through its 
continual change toward vicarious government, was never at rest, 
and therefore could hardly have been set forth with precision by the 

** Livy, IX, 46. o' Verr., in, 79. 

** Suet., Dom., ix. During the Commonwealth marriage was not a religious sacra- 
ment, but a civil contract. Such was also the case in the Scandinavian states until the 
introduction of Christianity. Du Chaillu, " The Viking Age," 11, 2, 12. Under the 
pagan Roman hierarchy marriage became a religious sacrament, and as such it was con- 
tinued by the hierarchy when it became " christianized." The inhibition of treasury 
officials from the pursuit of traffic still finds a place in modern legal codes, e. g. , in 
that of the United States of America. 



142 " THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

most accomplished lawyer that Rome possessed. Something of this 
sort is confessed by Tacitus at the opening of his History, where he 
says of the Augustan period, "A new constitution was established, 
undefined and little understood. " It is sufficient if we have succeeded 
in portraying some of its leading principles and the direction toward 
which their operation extended. These principles were chiefly the 
worship of Augustus as the Son of God, or of the reigning emperor, 
his vicegerent on earth; the establishment of an Hierarchy of which 
the reigning emperor was the high-priest ; and of a system of incipient 
Feudal relations between the church and the land, between emperor 
and nobles, patron and client, owners and slaves, Rome and her 
provinces. This system was soon to result in such divided authority 
that there practically existed no appeal, either lay or ecclesiastical, 
from the tyranny of proconsuls, the injustice of propraetors, or the 
rapacity of tax-gatherers. Rome was too far off. In the reign of Nero, 
when Fonteius Capito was inerely a legionary commander on the 
Lower Rhine, he sat in judgment upon a soldier, whom he condemned 
to death. "Then," said the prisoner, "I shall appeal to Caesar." 
Capito arose and placing himself on a higher seat of the tribunal said 
to the man : " Now, appeal to Caesar (he is here) ; make your defence 
in his presence." The soldier ignorantly obeyed, and, as a conse- 
quence, was condemned to execution. This incident characterizes 
the drift of the entire system of government at the period named. 
In the hierarchy, planned by Julius and carried out by Augustus, the 
city of Rome was made the pivot upon which all the affairs of the 
world were required to turn; and there both Herod and Tiridates 
knelt to receive their vassal crowns and swear fealty to their suzerain, 
the Augustus. After being centred in the Augustus the imperial 
powers became feudalized and fell to the proconsuls and their vicars. 
In sacred empires of limited area, like Egypt or Japan, centraliza- 
tion of government does not seem to have been attended with the 
same disadvantages of administration ; but the Roman empire was so 
extensive and its centralization so extreme, that its powers rapidly 
and largely fell into the hands of feudatories, who made haste to en- 
force other decrees besides those of a distant and over-occupied 
sovereign. When the widespread injustice and inconvenience which 
this system occasioned, is taken into consideration, it should occa- 
sion wonder, not that the empire broke to pieces, but that it lasted 
so long as it did last. 



143 



CHAPTER VIII. 

CHRISTIANIZATION OF THE ROMAN INSTITUTES. 

Appropriation of the pagan ecclesiastical organization, its myths, ceremonies, priests, 
Testments, temples, lands, treasures, revenues, slaves, rites, symbols, and dates — 
Illustrations — ^ra — Year — Festivals — Week — Calendar. 



M"12 



ODERN historians are far from being agreed in respect of the 
ence exercised by Christianity upon Roman civilization. 
Some, with Dr. Adams, suppose that Christianity made few or no 
changes in the constitution, while others claim that a complete revo- 
lution took place, that the light of the gospels penetrated every mind 
and converted the Roman world at once to a new religion and a new 
mode of life. Archaeology definitively settles this dispute and finds 
that the truth is between these extreme opinions. There were changes 
in the constitution, but there was no revolution. Catholicism entered 
the Roman world in much the same quiet way and from somewhat 
the same cause that Protestantism afterwards entered it. That cause 
was the corruption and avidity of the Roman pagan church and the 
doubts which direct intercourse with the Orient had cast upon its 
history and pretensions. * The Catholic reform was instigated by the 

' It will be borne in mind that the Roman church of the fourth century insisted upon 
the worship of the reigning emperors and yet tolerated numerous other sects, as the 
worshippers of Julius Caesar, of Augustus, of Venus, of Manes, of Mrthra, etc. The 
mythology of most of these religions, so far as it was publicly known at that period, 
was derived chiefly from Homer, Hesiod, the Sibylline books, and Virgil. With there- 
opening of direct commercial intercourse between India and Rome the Greek and Ro- 
man mythologies received a tremendous blow. The pagan incarnation myth, and all 
the mysteries and doctrines that hung upon it, were at once perceived to be Indian, 
andof much greater antiquity than the legends of Cres, Jasius, Bacchus, Belisus, Nabon- 
Issus and Romulus, or the deifications of Alexander, Seleucus, or the Csesars. Direct 
intercourse between Rome and India was first rendered possible when Ccesar conquered 
Egypt; it was greatly enlarged when Augustus dredged and reopened the Suez canal. 
This he seems to have done in B. C. 30. Suetonius, Aug., 18. A few years later, 
Strabo described the Indian fleet of Tiberius passing through this cutting into the Red 
Sea. The earliest Roman coins found in the Indian topes were denarii of Julius Csesar, 
Marc Antony, Augustus and some family coins. E.Thomas, " Jainism," p. 65. Coins 
of Augustus were very common in India. 



144 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

class which these pretensions most disgusted, and to whom the East- 
ern myths were most familiar; a class which included the best families 
of Rome, the Anciani, Bassi, Paulini, and Gracchi. ' The changes 
at first made in the constitution were so few and unostentatious that, 
as has been elsewhere shown with reference to Britain,^ they were 
scarcely noticed in the distant provinces, indeed they had but little 
effect anywhere beyond the immediate neighbourhood of the Roman 
temples and centres of ecclesiastical activity. A thousand years after 
Catholicism is said to have been preached in Rome it was almost un- 
known amongst the Huns of Pannonia, who lived less than 500 miles 
from the Eternal city. Charlemagne in the eighth century had in- 
deed prescribed it to the Avars, and that, too, with fire and sword; 
but not until the eleventh century was it generally accepted in the 
province which we now call Hungary. 

The first article of the Roman constitution and of the Roman church, 
from the first, certainly to the fourth centuries, the basis of the Sacred 
Empire, the cornerstone of imperial civilization, was the worship of 
Julius Caesar, or of Augustus, or of their official successors, the reign- 
ing emperors of Rome; the establishment of this worship as a national 
religion; and the application to its support of landed estates, slaves, 
tithes, and other properties, revenues, or resources of the state. The 
first change which Christianity attempted, was to discourage this im- 
pious and degrading worship. This change was brought about so 
noiselessly that the new religion slipped almost into its place as 
the legal religion of the state, before precipitating any general dis- 
turbance. 

Christianity offered to theRomansaheavenly in place of an earthly 
deity; a vicarious atonement for human sin, in place of limitless 
ambition and cruelty; a picture of the earthly life of a pure and loving 
Saviour as opposed to the violence, sensuality, and infirmities of the 
deified Roman sovereigns. It offered hopes of social freedom, it fore- 
shadowed the alleviation of caste and slavery, and with these reforms 
it promised a restoration of the family. These are reasons potent 
enough to account for its acceptance in Rome without the interven- 
tion of miracles. Its special fitness for Rome ^ is precisely what 
temporarily disqualified it for the provinces and delayed its accept- 
ance in all places remote from the capital. The Goths saw behind 

' The author of Paul's Epistles avers that at Jerusalem he first tried to convert the 
people of "reputation." Galatians, ii, 2. * "Ancient Britain," chapter x. 

^ When the religion of Galatia had been followed in Rome for several hundred years, 
it had degenerated in Galatia beyond recognition. 



CHRISTIANIZATION OF THE ROMAN INSTITUTES. 145 

it a continuance of the hierarchy and passionately rejected it; whilst 
the Hebrews stubbornly refused to substitute it for the worship of 
Jehovah. In offering as an object of adoration, a sinless Son of God 
in place of the sovereign-pontiff of Rome, Christianity effected the 
main purpose of its mission at a single stroke; the principles which 
it was foreseen would spring from the reform were bound to blossom 
in time; therefore at the beginning it practically stopped short with 
this simple change and demanded but little more than faith in the 
Christ, a demand which Theodosius took care to render effectual by 
the severe penalties which he attached to nonconformity. 

The nature of the empire was not altered by this change of religion, 
it was still an hierarchy, it was still the Sacred empire, indeed more 
sacred than before, its emperor was still the sacred emperor and he 
was now, as the Christian pontifex-maximus, the vicegerent of Christ 
upon earth. The laws, the morals, the customs, rites, symbols and 
ceremonies of Rome all remained for a time substantially unchanged. 

Mosheim ^ cautiously remarks that "the primitive Christians used 
the very same terms employed in the heathen mysteries and adopted 
some of the rites and ceremonies of which these renowned mysteries 
consisted." In Rome and afterwards in the western provinces, the 
ecclesiastical organization, the priests, vestments, lands, treasures, 
revenues, livings, slaves, mysteries, rites, customs, ceremonies, fes- 
tivals, symbols, ' ' properties, " zodiacs and calendars of paganism, were 
all, or nearly all, adopted by the early Catholics ; indeed some of them, 
as steeples, bells, crosses, tonsures, crooks and the like, are so an- 
cient that they can be seen painted on the Egyptian scroll of Ani 
and written in the Book of the Dead. ° The Roman pagan temples 
were changed into Christian churches, sometimes by mere reconse- 
cration, as the Caesarium of Alexandria, ' the Augusteum of Ancyra, 
the temple of the Celestial Venus at Carthage and the Pantheon of 
Rome (formerly dedicated to " Cybele and all the gods," afterwards 
to "Mary and all the saints");** sometimes they were changed by 

^ Ecc. Hist., I, 204. 

* Modern works on the History of Architecture do not notice steeples or spires fur- 
ther backward than the Norman age. 

' Socrates, vii, 15; Evagrius, 11, 8. Athanasius says it was rebuilt, but is not sup- 
ported in this assertion by the other ecclesiastical writers. St. Peter's and St. Clement's 
of Rome, the Cathedrals of Cologne, Notre Dame, (St. Stephen's,) of Paris, West- 
minster, (St. Stephen's,) and St. Paul's, of London, and hundreds of other Christian 
churches, stand on the sites of pagan temples. 

^ Brady, 11 241. Pope Boniface IV. says, in the inscription now on the edifice, that 
it was formerly dedicated to "Jove and all the gods; " Brady says it was to " Cybele 



146 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

demolishing the sacred edifices and using their materials to construct 
new ones. ' There are even instances where the original pagan name 
of the temple was preserved. Thus, the temple of Apollo was re- 
habilitated as the church of Saint Apollinaris, and that of Mars as 
the church of Sta. Martina, the latter with this inscription: 

Martyrii gestans virgo Martina coronam 
Ejecto hinc Martis numina Templa tenet. 

Mars hence ejected, Martina, martyred maid, 
Claims now the worship which to him was paid. 

The burial-grounds belonging to the pagan temples were legally 
acquired by the Christian congregations and continued in their pre- 
vious use without interruption. The cemetery of Montmartre (mons 
Martis) at Paris derived its name from a temple of Mars, which stood 
upon the hill during the Roman period. It has therefore, probably, 
been used as a burial-ground for upwards of eighteen centuries. Dur- 
ing the empire there were 424 temples in Rome; there are now 365 
churches which supplant them, the difference in number being about 
one-seventh. Many of these churches stand upon the grounds of the 
ancient temples and are constructed of the same materials." 

Some of the pagan customs, which were adopted by the Catholics, 
have been already discussed. It will now be instructive to examine 
the character of some others, and to observe how little they disturbed 
the previously existing order of affairs. Such an examination will 
hardly fail to prove that the prodigious difference which now ex- 
ists between paganism and Christianity has been the work of time, 
and that the grandeur and sublimity which distinguishes the latter is 

and all the gods." The reader can take his choice between these authorities. A num- 
ber of similar reconsecrations are mentioned in Rudolf o Lanciani's " Ancient Rome," 
London, 18S8, p. xiii. Among them is the temple of Mater Matuta, now San Stefano, 
or St. Stephen's, of Rome. 

^ The metempsychosis of temples has been similar to that of religious ceremonies. 
Belzoni reported that the pyramids — some of the smaller ones — were built from the 
materials of still more ancient temples, many of the stones having inscriptions upon 
them which denote their remoter antiquity. The same statement is made by Perrot 
and Chipiez, "Egyptian Art," i, 322. In a similar manner, the Romans robbed the 
Etruscans, many of whose gods now stand in our museums falsely ticketed with Ro- 
man names. St. Peter's is built almost entirely of anciently carved stones and itserection 
"did more injury to classical remains than ten centuries of barbarism." (Lanciani, p. 
154.) As we robbed the Romans, so shall we be robbed in turn. The law of Nature 
is eternal evolution. 

'" Lanciani's " Ancient Rome." In A. D. 382-8, there were " many pagan temples 
and altars in all the streets of Rome." St. Ambrose, to the emperor Valentinian II. 
re Symmachus. 



CHRISTIANIZATION OF THE ROMAN INSTITUTES. I47 

derived entirely from moral sources, and does not at all reside in those 
forms, rites, observances, festivals or legends, which the ignorant in 
all ages have been urged to regard and have clung to as the essential 
part of religion. It was perhaps because they were imbued with this 
belief that the fathers of the Christian reform cared little what cos- 
mogony, ritual or calendar was adopted, provided they succeeded in 
weaning Rome from the degrading worships into which it had fallen 
or been forced." They made no attempt to change the nature of the 
Roman constitution. The government went on after the reign of 
Theodosius precisely as it had gone on before his reign, that is to say, 
continually sinking into a more and more feudal form; yet always re- 
taining enough vitality to wind its shrivelled arms around the distant 
provinces. 

The ^ra. During the Commonwealth the Romans reckoned by 
Consulates, and, when the period of these was unfamiliar, they reck- 
oned by reference to the Greek Olympiads. The Ludi Saeculares which 
were celebrated every no years also afforded a convenient basis of 
reckoning. The custom of reckoning from the incarnation of Romu- 
lus, or as it was ingeniously misnamed, the year of the building of the 
city, A. U. C, does not seem to have grown up until near the Julian 
period. After the deification or incarnation of Julius Csesar, which 
occurred on the winter solstice of our B. C. 48, it became the custom 
to reckon time from that event, and although some half of a century 
later this sera was superceded by the date of the Advent, Apotheosis, 
or Ascension of Augustus, the Julian sera had already taken root in 
Roman Africa, Spain, Portugal and Southern France, where it con- 
tinued in use down almost to the period of the discovery of America, 
and is still seen on numerous charters preserved in the National Mu- 
seums in London, Paris and Madrid."^ 

The reform of the calendar, made by Sosigenes, under the direc- 
tion of Julius Caesar, was, according to Mommsen " and Dr. 
Morrell, one year before the death of Julius ; according to Dr. Adams 
and Mr. Carr, it was two, according to Noel it was three, and ac- 

" Mr. E. P. Meredith and other scholars, who, like him, have attempted to prove 
that "Christianity was originally a priapic religion and continued so until a very late 
period," make the mistake of assuming Christianity to be some fixed form of faith. It 
never was fixed and never will be. In each age of its existence, considered by itself, 
it represented as nearly as was practicable the highest religious ideals of man. What- 
ever grossness it ever contained was shared by all contemporaneous religions practised 
in the same places. 

'^ Excepting in Egypt and some of the Asiatic provinces. , 

'* Mommsen, iv, 586, ed. Dickson. 



148 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED, 

cording to Dr. Smith, four years before. By some writers the be- 
ginning of the Julian year is believed to have been adopted from the 
date, and because, of this reform"; but to such a theory there is a 
fatal objection; seras intended for popular acceptation are never 
based upon mere scientific reforms, because this vi^ould doom them to 
disuse, (witness that of Scaliger, mentioned below,) but upon some 
great mundane event, real or imaginary, and easily comprehended 
and recalled by the popular mind. The event commemorated by the 
Julian sera was the deification of Julius Caesar in the temple of Jupi- 
ter Ammon, B. C. 48, shortly after the battle of Pharsalia. The text 
of Tacitus reckons from " the battle of Philippi," when Brutus and 
Cassius, who had overthrown Caesar, were themselves overthrown. 
But this text is corrupted, or else Tacitus had an aerato himself; for 
nobody else used it." The ecclesiastical historians, Evagrius and 
Pope Gregory XIII., both alluded to the Julian sera (our) B. C. 48; 
but the former evasively called it the aera of Antioch. It is easy to 
see why Evagrius was made to prefer the name Antioch to designate 
the common aera of his reputed day rather than that of Julius, whom 
he regarded as Anti-christ; and why the Benedictine authors of L'arL 
de Verifier les Dates and the Abbe Lengletde Fresnoy sought refuse 
in similar evasions; but there is no excuse for those modern histori- 
ans and chronologists who insist upon calling the Julian asra the 
" Spanish," weakly attributing it to "the year following the con- 
quest of Spain by Augustus." 

With the Advent of Augustus everything was changed. The in- 
terval between those actual events which synchronised with the pre- 
tended incarnation of Romulus or the supposed building of Rome (say 
738 years before) was altered in the the record of the Quindecemviral 
College to the extent of seventy-eight years, in order to bring the 
Sixth Ludi Saeculares exactly to the year of the Advent of Augustus. 
Censorinus distinctly says that according to the Quindecemviral 
records the Ludi Saeculares were instituted in A. U. 298, in the con- 
sulate of M. Valerius and Sp. Verginius. This date, A. U. 298, is a 
Quindecemviral one: subtract two Ludi Saeculares from it, that is to 
say twice no years, and the remainder measures the alteration made 
by the Augustan astrologers, namely seventy-eight years, because 
the Ludi Saeculares marked an astrological epoch — one-sixth of an 
aeon, or the cycle of an incarnation — and the incarnation in this case 

'■• Putnam's Cyclopedia of Chronology, p. 42, 

'* That the text of Tacitus has been corrupted is asserted by Gibbon and admitted 
by all the critics. Several extensive portions of it are entirely wanting 



CHRISTIAN12ATI0N OF THE ROMAN INSTITUTES. 149 

was that of Romulus. Censorinus also says that the great Festival 
marked by these games was celebrated by Augustus and Agrippa 
A.U 737 in the consulate of C. Furnius and C. Junius Silanus. Add 
the fraction of a year dropped from the calendar by the Augustan 
astrologers and this makes A. U. 738. Add fifteen years afterwards 
restored to the calendar by the Christian astrologers and it makes A. U. 
753, this (753) being the number of years allowed by the Christian as- 
trologers between the building of Rome and the Nativity of Jesus. 

It can be shown beyond a doubt that the Ascension of Augustus 
and the Nativity of Jesus related to the same year and that after the 
date of the former was bestowed on the latter, it (the Ascension of 
Augustus) was pushed out of place fifteen years to destroy its 
identity. By our calendar the date of the death and pretended 
Ascension of Augustus was August 29th, A. D. 14. On the winter 
solstice or Brumalia following this notable event a new ajra was be- 
gun and the first year was called the year i, Anno Domini, of our 
Lord, meaning Tiberius, but as that prince refused to be worshipped 
or addressed as a god, Anno Domini was finally assigned to Augustus, 
whose asra, so far as the year is concerned, was thus shifted from 
that of his Advent to that of his pretended Ascension into heaven, 
as mentioned by Suetonius and other writers of the period. Sub- 
tract the fifteen years corruption of the calendar last named from 
A. D. 14 makes one year before A. D. i. This was the year both of 
the Ascension of Augustus and the Nativity of Jesus. 

It is claimed by the Latin Sacred College that in A. D. 528 a 
monk named Dionysius Exiguus calculated and fixed the sera of 
Jesus Christ, which he commenced on December 25th, A. U. 753, 
but this claim is not supported by the facts in the case. What is 
known to have occurred is that either in the eighth century or later, 
but certainly not in the sixth century, somebody, whether Dionysius 
Exiguus or not, is immaterial, altered the Augustan sera to the extent 
of fifteen years by adding that number of years to the Roman cal- 
endar; and, calling the Augustan sera that of Jesus Christ,'" he pro- 

■® The Christian sera, attributed to Dionysius, is said to have been carried into Gaul 
by the monks, toward the end of the sixth century. It is also said to have been men- 
tioned at the Council of Chelsea, S16, and used by Charles the Bald in 877 as "the 
year of our Lord;" but in fact it was not publicly nor commonly employed as the 
"Christian " aera in either France or England until some centuries later. Indeed, it 
did not supercede the " Augustan" aera in Italy until the Renaissance, nor the Julian 
sera in Spain or Portugal until shortly before the discovery of America. Therefore its 
use in the text of Charles the Bald does not imply either its recognition as the "Chris- 
tian" sera or its general adoption in France. That prince was the king of Italy and a 
vassal of Pope John VIII. 



I^O THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

cured its acceptance in the city of Rome, beyond whose precincts, 
however, it quite failed to take root; for the provinces continued to 
employ either the Julian or the Augustan aera." 

Several attempts are alleged of the fourth and fifth centuries to 
get rid of the Julian and Augustan geras, because they were a con- 
tinual reminder of the impious religion of imperial deifications. 
Thus it is claimed that the general ecclesiastical council, (which as- 
sembled at Nicea, in Galatia, Anno Julio 373, or A. D. 325) ordered 
that the eera among " Christians" should celebrate the victory of 
Constantine over Maxentius, 8 cal. October, in the year now called 
A. D. 312, and that every period of fifteen years from the first day 
of the following year should be marked by an Indiction.** It is 
claimed that the Constantinian sera was adopted by the Latin church 
in 342, and attempted to be made general throughout Christendom; 
but, if so, which is very doubtful, the attempt completely failed. 
The ecclesiastical writer, Socrates, who is assigned to the fifth cen- 
tury, in choosing an asra which he thought would be commonly un- 
derstood, deemed it necessary to revert to the old Greek olympiads. 
For example, he says that the Emperor Valens was killed in the 
fourth year of the 289th Olympiad; but nobody followed him in this 
revival of the olympiads; and it fell as flat as the sera of Constan- 
tine. The sera of Julius or Augustus Caesar still continued to remain 
the point of time from which the Roman world dated all its trans- 
actions. It was not until after the time of Mahomet that any 
Christian sera, known as such, was in public use anywhere. Some of 
the eastern provinces had substituted for the Julian or the Augustan 
aera the regnal year of the various sovereign-pontiffs of Rome," or 
that of Alexander, or that of Demetrius, or that of Diocletian. Most 

" The determination attributed to Dionysius Exiguus has not even met with the 
approval of modern mythochronologists, among whom there are no less than eleven dif- 
ferent years assigned to the incarnation of Jesus Christ. 

1^ A tribute was levied every fifteen years and called an indiction; a term which was 
afterwards applied to the period itself. Indictions are mentioned in the Theodosian 
code; but the Nicean story is probably anachronical, for the custom of dating by indic- 
tions appears on coins of a date earlier than Constantine. Indictions are mentioned 
by Pliny the younger. They probably began B. C. 30. 

19 Thus Josephus, Ant., xviii, ii, i, dates from the battle of Actium, which by some 
■ authors is regarded as synonymous with "the first year of Augustus," meaning that of 
his advent B. C. 40. On the mummy case of Pelemenon, brought to Paris by M. Cail- 
laud, from a family tomb near Thebes, the death of the decedent is inscribed as hav- 
ing occurred in " the nineteenth year of our Lord Trajan." Letronne, on the Zodiac 
of Dendera, p. 9; a fact which goves to prove that the Augustan aera did not take root 
in Egypt as it did in Europe. 



CHRISTIANIZATION OF THE ROMAN INSTITUTES. 151 

of the western provinces held on to the Julian or Augustan seras, or 
else to the annual consulates; but no province, east or west, north 
or south, reckoned by the asra of Jesus Christ, In this respect 
therefore, the Roman constitution remained unchanged, and when 
change did occur, it proceeded so slowly and by such imperceptible 
degrees, that the Julian sera remained in use in some parts of the 
empire until the discovery of America. We shall find the same thing 
with respect to many other institutes of Rome; there was no revo- 
lution: all the changes were gradual. The reader will find the 
Roman aera treated at greater length in the author's work on the 
"Worship of Augustus Csesar." 

The Year. Without, in this place, referring to the remote period 
when the worship of the Sun and the division of the year into eight 
months of forty-five days, with intercalaries, prevailed in Assyria and 
Babylonia, it may be briefly stated that immediately before the fall 
of Assyria both of these states employed a year of ten months, each 
of thirty-six days, with intercalaries, and that the year commenced 
on the vernal equinox, which then agreed with the first Nissan. After 
the fall of Assyria, the Babylonians altered the first day of the year 
to the winter solstice, which then fell, or was afterwards pretended 
to have fallen, on Buddha's day, our Wednesday. '"' At a later period, 
about B.C. 582, they' redivided the year into twelve months, each of 
thirty days, with intercalaries, and dated this change back to their 
imaginary Nebu-Nazaru, or Nabon-Issa, thus making it agree, so far 
as the year is concerned, with the aera of the real Tiglath-pil-Esar II. 
They so inserted the two new months as to retain as nearly as possible 
the usual days for the great festivals. This was done by placing them 
after the last and before the first of the old months; a device which 
they learnt from the Eastern and transmitted to the Western world. *' 
These changes left them with a twelve months' year commencing 
on February 25th, which they altered to February 26th in order to 
make it fall on the same day of the septuary week, (the Fourth, or 
Buddha's day, or Wednesday,) as the winter solstice. Hence the sera 
which originally commenced on December 25th, B. C. 748, became 
February 26th, B. C. 747, and as such it still appears in the Almagest 
of Ptolemy. This sera continued in use down to the overthrow of 
Babylon by Cyrus and, in some parts of the empire, to the epoch of 
Alexander the Great. 

'" The Babylonian year, beginning on the winter solstice, is mentioned by Diod. Sic, 
xxn, 220, and Higgins, Anacal., i, 214, 261. 

'■" Mommsen claims, with judgment, that this was done by the Decemvirs. 



152 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

The Egyptians had a similar year of ten months commencing on 
the vernal equinox. This was followed by a year (also) of ten months, 
but commencing on the winter solstice, and it is quite possible that 
the two calendars for a time were employed concurrently. The 
Ptolemaic year, as the result of an adjustment similar to that made 
by the Chaldeans, commenced on our February 26th. By a process 
which is described in the work above cited Augustus shifted this to 
August 26th, and after his death it was altered, by the Sacred Col- 
lege, to August 29th, where it stands yet. 

Plutarch, in Numa, says that the year of Romulus had 360 days. 
From a remark of Livy " it would appear that the odd five days which 
the Romans were well aware was necessary to make up the actual 
year, were not intercalated each year, but, following the Greek cus- 
tom, after an interval of several years. He says: "An intercalation 
was made in the calendar of this year (A. U^ 582), intercalary calends 
being reckoned on the third day after the feast of Terminus." In- 
deed, the equable year of 360 days, with or without intercalation, 
seems to have been common to all the civilized nations of antiquity 
and points to a common Oriental source. 

Following the Greeks or Etruscans, from whom they derived many 
of their customs, the early Romans divided the year into ten months, 
each of thirty-six days, with five intercalaries. " This Roman year 
began on the winter solstice, (11 cal. Mali,) on which day great re- 
joicings were observed and presents were exchanged. " According 

^^ Livy, xLiii, II. 

*' For year of ten months, see Varro.Ovid, Livy, Macrobius, (Sat., i, 12,) and Cen- 
sorinus; (De die Natale, cap. 20;) also consult the Index to this work, word " Ten." 
The alleged year of 304 days ascribed to Romulus by Macrobius is probably a corrup- 
tion inserted in the Venetian folio of his " Saturnalia," in order to conceal the ancient 
ninth day of festivity or rest. 

^* See Appendix M, year B.C. 753. In the Alban year of ten months the first month 
was May; the second, April; the third, March; the fourth, June; the remainder were 
named numerically down to and including December, which was the tenth and last 
month. The sera of Romulus was the eleventh calends of May, that is to say, eleven days 
before the last day of December, which, as each month then had thirty-six days, was 
the 25th December, the winter solstice. At a later period May and March exchanged 
places and two new thirty-day months were inserted between December and March. 
The eleventh calends of May thus came to be translated 21st April, a meaningless date, 
which conceals the antiquity of Brumalia. or Christmas, and its identity with the first 
day of the aera of Romulus. In the same way the Champs de Mai and the Campus 
Martins, which were the same thing, were differentiated. The barbarians kept the 
first of May as the New-Year day long after the Romans juggled it of its significance. 
At the assemblages on this day presents of horses were made to the chieftains. Du 
Cange, Fourth Dissert. Eginhard always commences the New- Year in March, at Easter. 



CHRISTIANIZATION OF THE ROMAN INSTITUTES. 153 

to Livy, Numa, aboutA. U. 40, " made the Roman year to consist of 
twelve lunations of twenty-nine and a-half days (alternately twenty- 
nine and thirty) and one day over for luck, altogether 355 days, to- 
gether with, every other year, a brief intercalary month, called Mer- 
cedinus or Mercedonius. ^^ This solar-lunar year and the old solar 
year were expected to exactly coincide once in twenty-four years, " 
but as the length of Mercedonius was left to the discretion of the 
chief-pontiff, the system in time fell out of joint. The last of the 
twelve months of twenty-nine and a-half days which we are informed 
were substituted by Numa for the previous ten months of thirty-six 
days, were named January and February, after the gods Janus and 
Februus, and the year ended with the last day of February. ^^ This 
made it agree, within four days, with the shifted sera of Nabon-Issus. 

The lunar year attributed to ' ' Numa " is anachronical. The ancient 
year of the commonwealth was solar and consisted of ten months, 
each of 36 days. In A. U. 304 the Decemvirs changed this year to 
one of twelve months, each of 30 days. At a later period this ar- 
rangement was altered to a solar-lunar year of 355 days, which was 
falsely attributed to Numa. It is this system which produced such 
confusion that in the time of Cicero the vernal equinox fell, accord- 
ing to the calendar, in May. (Cic. ad Att., x, 17-18.) 

In A. U. 706 this calendar was reformed by Julius Caesar, who 
established a solar year that began on the calends of January," a 
day which seems to have been appointed for the beginning of the 
year at a previous date, namely, in the consulship of Q. Fulvius No- 

'* Mrs. Gatty, in the Archselogical Journal for 1889, says that the Roman year was 
not in fact divided into twelve months until the time of Papirius Cursor, A. U. 461; 
but I can find no warrant for this statement. 

*® Mercedonius dixerunt a mercede solvenda. Festus. The rents of farms were paid 
in this month, from which it may be inferred that during the Commonwealth, (not 
during the empire,) the usual farm-lease was of two years. It is said that Julius Csesar 
appointed certain days in July, September and November, for the payment of harvest- 
wages, etc., called mercedonise dies, or pay-days. However this may be, mercedonius 
appears to be much older than Ccesar. '^^ Livy, i, 19. 

''^Cic, Legg., II, 21: Ovid, Fasti, 11,49; Tibulus, in, i, 2. 

^^ Pliny, xxviii, 2, 5. A New-Year's gift was called strena. Suet., Cal., 42. Non- 
nius Marcellus, a writer of the fifteenth century, says that Tatius, king of the Sabines, 
having received on the sixth day of the New-Year some branches, probably of mistle- 
toe, Brady says vervain, cut in a wood consecrated to Strenia, the goddess of strength, 
gave her name to these gifts. Brady, Clavis Calend., i, 145. Haydn, voc. , '' New- 
Year's Day." This is apparently a medieval ecclesiastical legend, invented to account 
both for the calends of January, the sixth day after the winter solstice and for the 
thyrsus of Bacchus, Buddha, or Tat. See " The Worship of Augustus Csesar," ch. 
viii, year 769 B. C. 



154 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

bilior and T. Annius Luscus, A. U. 66i, when it substantially coin- 
cided with the winter solstice. 

However, the reader must be on his guard in accepting as a cer- 
tain guide any brief explanation of the changes which the Romans 
made in their calendar, because these were so numerous and intri- 
cate as to defy accurate condensation. In describing the calendars 
of Greece and Rome, the Rev. Edward Greswell found it necessary 
to fill no less than sixteen thick octavo volumes. The substance of 
these books cannot be compressed into a few lines. 

The alterations made or attempted to be made by Augustus, Tibe- 
rius and Claudius are mentioned elsewhere. Of Nero, Tacitus says 
that he "resolved to continue the old style, dating the year from 
the calends of January, a day rendered sacred by the established 
(official) religion of the Romans." '" The empire also observed an 
ecclesiastical year, beginning with the vernal equinox. This system, 
namely, an ecclesiastical year beginning with the vernal equinox in 
March, and a civil year beginning either upon or else a few days 
after the winter solstice, is in use at the present time. 

In reforming the later calendar of the commonwealth, that one 
which had grown out of joint with the solstices, Julius Caesar insti- 
tuted a single Year of Confusion, consisting of 445 days,^' and began 
a new and, as he believed, an astronomically and astrologically cor- 
rect year with the "calends of January," A. U. 707; that is to say, 
a few days after the winter solstice of A. U. 706. ^'^ In the Julian 
system, the length of the tropical year, previously assumed in the 
calendar to be 365 even days, was assumed to be exactly 365^ days, 
whereas, as since ascertained, not by deified emperors, but ordinary 
mortals, it is 365 days, 5 hours, 48 minutes and 46 seconds." 

Caius Caesar became a priest of Jupiter, A. U. 671, and a pontiff 
or member of the Sacred College in 681. Upon the death of Q. C. 
Metellus Pius, A. U. 690, Caesar became High-Priest. It may per- 
haps render further matters clearer to throw some of his dates into 
tabulary form. 

^"Tac, Annals, xiii, 10. 

^' Mommsen, iv, 568, says that Cassar added but 67 days to his correctional year. 
The same author asserts the tropical year to be 365d sh. 48m. 48s. long. 

^^ Suetonius, Jul., 40; Pliny, xvin, 25. 

^^ Hipparchus calculated the tropical year at 365d. 5h. 52m. 12s. Mommsen, Rome, 
iV, 586. This differs by 3m. from the calculation which Greswell deduces from Hip- 
parchus, viz., 365d. 5h. 55m. 12s. See the Chronology of the Julian Year in the 
"Worship of Augustus Cassar," p. 246. The determination in the text is that of Prof. 
Simon Newcomb, of the United States Naval Observatory at Washington, 



A.U. A.J, 


, B.C, 


654 - 


100 


671 - 


83 


63i - 


73 


690 - 


64 


694 - 


60 


706 - 


48 


706 - 


48 


706 - 


48 


706 - 


48 



christianization of the roman institutes. 155 

Biographical Chronology of Caius Julius Caesar. 

Birth of Caius, afterwards called Caius Julius Caesar. 

Appointed Flamen Dialis. 

Elected a member of the Sacred College. 

Elected Pontifex Maximus, March ist, afterwards shifted to 6th. 

Consul for five years, afterwards extended to ten years. Melmoth's 

Letters of Cicero, 11, 226, says A. U. 694; Lempriere says 695. 
Battle of Pharsalia, 9th August. Ccesar attains absolute power. 
Conquest of Egypt, opening of the inter-oceanic canal and acquisition 

of the Oriental trade by the Romans. 

Deified in the temple of Jupiter Ammon, on Brumalia (December 25th). 
"Antioch fixed its sera in Caius Julius Ctesar and made this year the 

first;" Johannes Atitiochenus MS. Geography, lib. ix, quoted in Pope 
Gregory's works, ed. 1665, p. 156. 

706 - 48 Evagrius evidently alludes to the Julian sera in the following sentence: 

" The second year of the reign of Leo (A.D. 458) occurred in the 506th 
year of the free prerogative of the city" (of Antioch). "Ecc. Hist." 11. 12. 

707 I 47 First numbered year of the Julian sera. Caesar's reform of the calendar 

in force from ist January this year. vSmith's Die. Bible. 

708 2 46 Julius Caesar deified by the senate of Rome March 25th. Some authors 

deduct 15 days and make this March loth. Humphreys, 296. A 
monument relating to this year has been found at Ebora (York) in 
Hispania, inscribed " Divo Julio;" i. e., the living god, Julius. 
710 4 44 Caesar assassinated March 15th, formerly dedicated to Anna Parenna, 
since called parricidium. 

As down to the reign of Theodosius the reigning emperor was al- 
ways the high-priest or chief-pontiff of the Roman empire he had the 
entire control of the calendar. What now follows will show some of 
the marks which these high-priests made upon it. 

Alterations of the Calendar. The system of Julius, which assumed 
the tropical solar year to be exactly 365^ days long, required the in- 
tercalation of one day in every four years. It is said that the Julian 
priests, not clearly understanding this rule, commenced to count 
"on" instead of "from," the leap year, and so inserted an inter- 
calary day every third, instead of fourth year,^* and that, in thirty- 
six years they intercalated twelve, instead of nine days. The reform 
of Augustus consisted of three principal features. I. He permitted the 
use of the Julian sera and added his own, which originally commenced 
in the year now known as B. C. 40, afterwards in the year now known 
as B.C, 15; II. He retained both the Julian New-Year day and the 
ecclesiastical New-Year day, the latter agreeing with the vernal equi- 
nox; ^'^ III. He sank three days of the Julian calendar, to correct 
the alleged blunder of the ecclesiastics. If these three days and the 
twelve days since sunken are taken out of the month of March the 

^* Macrobius. 

^* According to Carr, the reform of Augustus was ordered in A. U. 746, or B. C. 8, 
and went into effect A.U. 761, or A.D. 8. Antiquities, p. 367. But Carr had a very 
confused understanding of the calendar. For a more ample account consult the au- 
thor's " Worship of Augustus Caesar." 



156 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

loth would now be the 25th of that month.'' The pretended Ascen- 
sion of Augustus on the day of his death, the 29th August, is com- 
memorated in the Egyptian calendar noticed elsewhere in this work, 
also in the Papal calendar as the day of Saint Augustine. 

In his Annals, xi, 11, Tactius observes of the chronology of 
Claudius, that it differed from the system of Augustus; and he refers 
us to his own history of Domitian for particulars. This portion of 
his history has not been permitted to survive; and we are therefore 
without any means of knowing precisely what alterations of the calen- 
dar took place under Claudius. Judging from Suetonius, in Claudius, 
from the allusion made by Tacitus to an alteration of the calendar 
by Nero, and from the calculations shown in our Appendix S, the 
innovations of Claudius consisted of changing the aera to that of 
Romulus. However this may be, Nero altered the New-Year day 
again to the calends of January. 

The last alteration of the calendar known to have been made by 
any of the "pagan" emperors of Rome was effected by Diocletian. 
By dividing the imperial government into four departments, two to 
be ruled by Augusti and two by Caesars; by removing the seat of 
government from Rome — his own capital being established at Nico- 
media in Galatia," and that of Maximin, the other Augustus, at 
Milan; by practically extinguishing what remained of the Roman 
senate; by disbanding the praetorian guards and substituting bands 
of Jovians and Herculians; by taking his oath of office on the Sun; 
by solemnizing his treaty with the Nubians in the name of the same 
deity ; and by numerous other public acts, he plainly evinced an inten- 
tion to essentially and permanently alter the Roman religion as well as 
its system of government. But a national religion is not so amenable 
to alteration as some enthusiasts pretend. Although Diocletian's 
attempt to revive the solar worship was preceded by that of Elaga- 
balus, it completely failed. Religion, in common with all the other 
institutes of the Creator, has to obey the laws of evolution. Among 
other innovations Diocletian abolished the custom of dating the asra 
from Julius Caesar or Augustus, and ordered it to commence with his 

^* Many Chronicles of the Dark and Medieval ages begin the year on " Hilaria,"or 
the vernal equinox, which opened the ecclesiastical year. By beginning the year from 
the incarnation of Julius Ctesar, Hilaria was thrown into January, where it is now. 

^^ Nicomedia was on the gulf of Isstacus, (Astacus,) and occupied the site of the 
ruined city of Issus. It is now called by the Turks, Issmeed, or Iss-nik-mid. Near 
it is the river Sangarius, the city of Nicea, the district of Marian-dynia and other 
places anciently sanctified by the worship of Nabon-Issus, afterwards les, and of Maia, 
Maria, or Marian, Mother of the Gods. 



CHRISTIANIZATION OF THE ROMAN INSTITUTES. J 57 

own reign, the first day of which was September 17th, A. D. 284." 
This was afterwards shifted to September 29th, the day we now 
call Michaelmas. The sera of Diocletian was long in use throughout 
some portions of the Roman world, and it is still used by the Chris- 
tians of Nubia and Abyssinia. The Church of Rome endeavoured to 
bury the Ascension day of Augustus under an imaginary persecution 
of Christian martyrs by Diocletian, to which it has given the date of 
August 29th, A.D. 284. This was the Augustan Ascension day, and 
had nothing to do with Diocletian's persecution of "martyrs," which 
was precipitated by the demolition of the church of Nicomedia, on 
Terminalia, 23rd February, A.D. 303, and authorized for the first 
time by an imperial edict against all non-conformists issued on the 
following day. ^^ In like manner the Church buried the asra of Dio- 
cletian under the legend of Saint Michael. 

The alleged reformation of the calendar, by which it was intended 
to begin a new sera from the day that Constantine saw the Cross in 
the sky and the prophetic words, "In hoc signo vinces, " has been 
mentioned. The speedy failure and extinction of this asra, if, indeed, 
it was ever instituted at all, proves that the miraculous vision, whether 
seeming or pretended, which it was designed to commemorate, found 
no lodgment in the popular mind. Even the churchmen seem to have 
doubted Constantine's story; for they too have avoided the use of 
his aera. 

In A.D. 455 and 457, according to the aera now in use, attempts are 
said to have been made by the Church to change the calendar; but 
neither of these appear to have been successful." The next actual 
alteration of the calendar is alleged to have been made by Dionysius 
Exiguus under the Emperor Justinian. The sera adopted by this as- 
trologer — as shown in Appendix S — was really that of Augustus, 
which, however, he is said to have called the jera of Jesus Christ. 
The Augustan sera was then or has since been altered to the extent 
of fifteen years. The New-Year day attributed to D. Exiguus was that 
of Julius Caesar, namely, the calends of January. In all probability 

'^ Nicolas, (Chronology of History, p. 8,) says that "in A. D, 285, and Anno Mundi 
Alexandrino 5787, ten years were substracted, and that the year was called 5777;" but 
as he derives his information from the monkish work " L'art de Verifier les Dates," 
the alleged period of the alteration is not to be depended upon. It is very much more 
likely to have been made by the popes of the seventh century, who seem to have been 
not altogether satisfied with the sera ' ' invented " by the enterprising Dionysius Exiguus. 

^' Gibbon, i, 682. The venerable Dr. Adams, unable to account for an sera begin- 
ning on the 2gth of August, ascribed it to the celebration of Augustus' victory over 
the Rhsetians. Roman Antiq., p. 265. *" Brady, i, 294. 



15S THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

both the year and the day were used in Rome before and after this 
period. The New- Year da}^, beginning with the vernal equinox, was 
used in Gaul by the Merovingian princes, and continued to be em- 
ployed generally throughout Christendom until a comparatively re- 
cent period."' It was used in Pisa and probably also in Florence so 
late as 1745, and in America until 1752. It is still used in England 
for the beginning of the ecclesiastical and fiscal years, and the year 
for renewing rentals and leaseholds. The New- Year day of the Roman 
commonwealth, Brumalia, was also in use until the period of the leg- 
islation next to be mentioned. 

In 1582, when the Julian calendar was ten days out of joint with 
the solstices, Pope Gregory XIII. ordered that number of days to be 
sunk. This reform, under the cover of which some other changes 
were introduced, is called the "Gregorian." It was attempted to be 
enacted in England by a bill introduced in the Commons in 1585, but 
was soon after dropped. It was reintroduced and became the law in 
1751-2, 24 Geo. II., c. 23, and extended to the British colonies in 
America and elsewhere. The difference between the Julian calen- 
dar and the solstices, which, in the time of Gregory, was ten days, 
had now become eleven days; and this was accordingly the measure 
of the difference provided for in the English law. The same act also 
provided, as Julius Caesar had done before, that the year should be- 
gin on the ist of January." The Gregorian reform has never been 
adopted in the Greek provinces nor in Russia; the Julian measure of 
the year being still used in those countries. The 25th of March in 
England and America is therefore still the 13th March in Athens, 
Belgrade, and Moscovy." The Carlovingian princes employed either 
the vernal equinox or the winter solstice, or both, for beginning of 
their years; so also did the English princes. In the annual chronicles 

** Nicolas only commences the use of this New- Year day, (the vernal equinox,) in 
the fourteenth century. 

*^ The recital of this act sets forth that the legal year begins on the 25th March, and 
that it differs from the legal year of Scotland now in common usage throughout the 
whole kingdom. This last refers to the year beginning on the 25th December. The 
act then provides for a new year to begin ist January, 1752, a provision whose ob- 
servance finally extinguished that other Day, which, for practically 2500 years, had 
marked the apotheosis of Nabon-Issus and for precisely 3816 years had celebrated that 
of Buddha. This feature of the Gregorian calendar is said to have been tried experi- 
mentally a short time previously by means of an arret of Charles IX. of France, in 1564. 

** According to Lanciani, the leases of warehouses and safe deposits in Rome, tempo 
Hadrianus, as proved by inscriptions still extant, began annually on December 13th, 
(now the 25th,) the difference being the twelve days sunk since the pontificate of Greg- 
ory. "Pagan and Christian Rome," Boston, ed. 1893, p. 45. 



CHRISTIANIZATION OF THE ROMAN INSTITUTES. I59 

of Matthew Paris, written during the thirteenth century, each year 
duly begins on the 25th December. As mentioned elsewhere, William 
of Normandy was crowned on the 25th December, not the ist Janu- 
uary." Indeed, from Nero to the "reform" of the calendar by 
Gregory, the only New-Year days kept in England, secular or eccle- 
siastical, were ancient festivals. One of them was Hilaria, (Houli,) 
the other Brumalia (Brumess)." 

The four principal festivals of the solar worship celebrated in the 
northern hemisphere were the spring or vernal equinox, the summer 
solstice, the autumnal equinox and the winter solstice. Their observ- 
ance can be traced to the remotest period of history or tradition, 
and belongs to every nation and every wide-spread religion, of which 
we have any knowledge. After the invention of the incarnation 
myth in Hindustan, the vernal equinox was kept sacred to Maia, 
and because on this day the sun passed over the equator, the Jews 
were asked to believe that on the same day their forefathers passed 
dry-shod over the Red Sea. Among the pre-Christian Greeks and 
Romans the day was celebrated by the festivals of Magna Mater, 
Hilaria, and the Megalesian games; among the pre-Christian Gauls 
and Galatians by the feast of Virgo Paritura ; " among the pre-Chris- 
tian Saxons by that of lestera or Ostera, the goddess of regeneration. " 
This accounts for its other name of Easter, The festival is therefore 
both Vedaic, Brahminical, Buddhic and Gothic. Its exact date in vari- 

^* Stow says the coronation of William I. occurred on our first day of January and 
builds a new calendar on this blunder. Haydn, voc. " Year." The coronation took 
place on the winter solstice, or 25th of December. Hannay, Hist. Rep. of England. 

*^ The tenth Brahminical incarnation is pretended to have occurred during the thir- 
teenth century before the Christian sera. Lacroze believes that it is Brahma who is called 
by the Hindus of Malabar, Biroumas, and by the Cingalese, Piromis. This is a mis- 
take. Brumass, or Brumess, the name of a Malay god and festival, alludes to Bruma, 
or Buddha, who was, and not to Brahma, who was not, a Mess or Messiah. Herodotus 
informs us that the priests of Thebes in Egypt called each of the colossal figures in 
their temples " a Piromis," which, he was told, meant " beautiful and good." He says 
that these same Egyptian priests informed the ambitious Hecatceus that it was impos- 
sible for a human being to descend from a god. But since it was part of their religious 
doctrine that each Piromis was a god, and that each of their human kings was a Piromis, 
what they told Hecatseus appears to have had little application to the rest of mankind, 
and certainly did not apply to Julius Cnssar. Of these false Mess-iahs the Thebans pos- 
sessed the images of no less than three-hundred-and-forty-one. Herodotus, Euterpe, 
143, Some of them may be the identical figures now in the great collections of Paris 
and London. 

''^ Dupuis, III, 51, 4to ed.; Pelloutier, History des Celtes, v, 15. 

*■" Frickius, pt. II, ch. X, p. 98. See also the Etruscan Nurtius and Child, inGorius' 
Tuscan Antiquities. Ostera is the same as les-tera. 



l6o THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

ous countries varied a few days, as calendars varied or became defec- 
tive, or as fables and myths were invented to ' ' explain " or to conceal 
its astral origin. The day which, as we are taught, was chosen by the 
council of Nicse in A.D. 325 for the celebration of Easter, was the 
first Sabbath after the first full moon after the vernal equinox." 
Brady says that authorities are divided as to when the vernal equinox 
was first kept as a Christian festival, some even maintaining that this 
did not happen until the seventh century. After what has been shown 
herein with regard to the antiquity of this festival it is not deemed 
necessary to pursue the subject further. Sir Isaac Newton, in his 
"Prophecies of Daniel," showed that not only the solar festivals, but 
all the other principal ones observed by the early church, were 
Roman festivals fitted with new names. Since the introduction of 
Oriental literature into the West we are able to add that the Roman 
festivals were merely Buddho-Brahminical ones, with new names; 
and that the Buddho-Brahminical festivals were merely astral ones 
with new names. The Roman children kept Hilaria with eggs and 
fishes made of pastry or other sweets, the former typifying the 
genesis of the year, the latter symbolizing the entrance of the sun 
into Pisces. At the present day French children keep their Easter 
with fishes, German children with eggs, and English children with 
both eggs and fishes. Mr. Higgins cites many games, words, and 
expressions, still used in play by little children, which afford a key 
to the buried truths of history. Empires have arisen and fallen since 
these customs began ; but the children still observe them. Libraries 
have been burnt, monuments have been destroyed, cosmogonies 
have been forged, and powerful states have been swept away; yet 
the children, chaste instruments of a Divine and Inscrutable wisdom, 
remain the innocent guardians of toys and words of play, which, 
rightfully interpreted, possess the power to smash into atoms the 
entire structure of astrological imposture. 

Midsummer Day is a festival of the solar worship, which com- 
menced on the midnight preceding the summer solstice, and marked 
the beginning of the eight months' year. It was successively adopted 
by the Brahmins and Brahmo-Buddhists both in Hindustan, Assyria, 
Chaldea, Greece and Rome, whence it has descended to us and is 
still observed in Ireland and in the rural parts of France, Scotland 
and England, with bonfires and games which have descended from 

*^ Jean Hardouin, the Jesuit Father, who compiled the proceedings of the church 
councils, warns us not to rely upon their truth or correctness. He regarded many of 
them as having been composed or greatly altered in modern times. 



CHRISTIANIZATION OF THE ROMAN INSTITUTES. l6l 

the remotest antiquity. In the Assyrian ritual the ceremonies of this 
solstice were sacred to Belus, or Baal, a circumstance which is 
marked by the retention and existing use of the name Baal-fires. 
The Rev. Alex. Hislop says that in Babylon the summer solstice 
was connected with the legend of Joannes, the fish-god, and that this 
suggested the Roman legend of Santo loannes, or Saint John. After 
this, it is scarcely necessary to add that neither the day nor the 
ceremonies attached to it have anything whatever to do with St, John, 
whose connection with it is a comparative late invention." Accord- 
ing to Brady, Midsummer Day was first instituted as a Christian fes- 
tival A. D. 488; but in fact it is not likely to have been observed by 
the Church until after the adoption of the vernal equinox festival. 

The day of the autumnal equinox, one of the four great solar festi- 
vals, appears to have been first adopted for the beginning of the 
year in China. It was certainly adopted by Seleucus Epiphanes as 
the day of his pretended "incarnation," in the year B. C. 312-11. 
From this deified sovereign, who conquered and enslaved Judea, it 
descended to the Jews, by whom it is still observed. The pagan 
Romans observed it on account of its solar origin: the Christian 
Romans, on account of its Jewish origin: and the Jews because it 
was forced upon them. All of these nations invented new legends 
to explain its observance; the Jews that of the Tabernacles, and the 
Christians that of Saint Michael.^" 

Like the Sabat of the ancient Hebrews, the Nundine of the Romans 
was the only day of the week that had a name; the others were desig- 
nated numerically; the Hebrew days with reference to Sabat, the 
Roman days with reference to Nundinum or Feriarum.^' The relig- 
ious ceremonies peculiar to Nundinum consisted of sacrificing a ram 

*' The story of Salome, the bloody head and the bodkin, will be detected in the more 
ancient one of Fulvia and the head of Cicero. 

*" Brady attributes the institution of Michaelmas to Pope Boniface III., A. D. 606. The 
four days difference between the 25th September and Michaelmas; the goose that is eaten 
on this festival; the difference between Michaelmas and Martinmass, which last is an 
older quarter day; besides many other details of the calendar, prove its composite 
structure and serve to disclose its history. For example, the fifteen days' difference 
between the beginning of the Oxford and Cambridge autumnal terms, October loth 
and September 25th, are the sum of the alterations made by Augustus, Pope Gregory, 
and the act of 1751-2. Some further details concerning the place and significance of 
this equinox in the calendar will be found in our Appendix P. 

** Tooke's Pantheon, 289. The Roman division of the month into three uneven 
parts, instead of four even ones, is a lunar patch upon a more ancient solar calendar, 
beneath which a bit of the original cloth, nones, is disclosed. This uneven division is 
of Indian origin. 



l62 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

or lamb, (aries, agnus,) to Jupiter, in the Regia or palace of the high- 
priest, and the chaunting of prayers or hymns of praise. After this, 
the day was observed as a festival.''' This is practically the manner 
in which the day of rest is still kept in all Christian countries, except 
those, which, like England and her colonies, (especially New Eng- 
land,) have been under Puritan influence, the Puritans (of the seven- 
teenth century) having borrowed their views of this day directly from 
the Hebrew scriptures. From the Buddhic term mess, are derived 
the Latin term missa, the English mass, and the German messe. 
The use of this term for a fair, or wake, arose from the practice of 
holding fairs on the middle day of the week. The Roman ninth day 
of festivities, or rest, was observed down to the period when Budd- 
hism or Bacchism made its impress upon the institutes of the com- 
monwealth." That the seven-day week emanated from Hindustan is 
proved by the fact that the Hindu days of the septuary week are 
named, as ours are, from the sun, moon, and five nearest planets, and 
in the same order, and second, by the fact that this custom is older 
in Hindustan then elsewhere. The same facts pertain and the same 
inference is deducible as between the Gothic, English and Latm 
names and present order for the days of the week, the Latin being 
the most recent. 

Originally the Gothic year consisted of eight months, each of 
forty-five days, afterwards probably of ten months, each of thirty- 
six days; while at a later period it was divided into twelve months 
each of thirty days. These months were solar and divided into six 
weeks, each of five days," a regulation apparently derived from the 

" Livy, in, 35; Dionys., 11, 28; vii, 58; Varro, de re Rust, praef., 11; Macrobius, 
Sat., I, 16. The Portuguese still name the days of the week as the Romans did; for 
example, primafeira, secundafeira, terciafeira, etc. Miiller, Etrusker, 11, 324, seq., 
suggests an eight-day week; a theory that hides the Roman nundinum. Boys were 
baptized on the ninth day, girls on the eighth; and this appears to be all the founda- 
tion there is for Miiller's eight-day week. Mommsen, i, 232, suggests four different 
kinds of weeks, varying from six to nine days; an hypothesis which may serve to recon- 
cile the mutilated texts of Rome, but is opposed to common sense. 

*^ Modern ecclesiastical writers ascribe the Roman adoption of the seven-day week, 
and the observance of Sunday for the Sabbath, to Constantine; the monk, John of 
Nikios, who wrote in the seventh century, ascribed these changes to the xra. of Socrates. 
The Latin names and present order of the seven days do not appear to be older, if 
indeed they are as old as the reign of Justinian. Brady, who wrote before the work 
of John of Nikios was discovered, says: " The Romans did not reckon their days by 
hebdomades or sevenths until after the time of Theodiosus." Clavis, Calendaria, I, 96. 
If so, the passage in Dion Cassius is spurious. 

*"• Du Chaillu, i, 38. See Appendix P to the present work. 



CHRISTIANIZATION OF THE ROMAN INSTITUTES. l6 



O 



Tibetans, or the Mongol Chinese, some of whom continue it to this 
day. A five-day week was also employed by the Aztecs, ^^ and is still 
employed by the pagan Javanese.^® With the Aztecs the second was 
Woden's day, while the fifth was Fair-day, or Sunday. The five days of 
the Goths were named Tyrs-dag, Wodens-dag, Thors-dag, Fria-dag, 
and Langar or Thyalt-dag. The first four were named after the planets 
known to us as Mars, Mercury, Jupiter and Venus. The fifth means 
"bath" or "wash" day." After the pagan Roman week had been 
shortened by two days, the pagan Gothic five-day week was length- 
ened by the same number of days, and to these supplementary days 
were given the Gothic names of the sun and moon. Then christening 
bath-day by the nobler name of Saturn, the naming of the septuary 
week in which we now rejoice, was complete.^* 

Were it necessary, these proofs of the ancient pre-Christian origin 
of various existing institutes and observances might be greatly mul- 
tiplied. It could be shown that monogamy, baptism, naming, church- 
ings, the white linen garments of priests, the eagles, doves, lambs, 
fishes, and nearly all, if not indeed all of the ritual, symbols, festivals 
and observances of papal Rome were borrowed through Pagan Rome 
from the Orient, But as our object in touching the subject is merely 
to remove certain untruths from the pages of history, and not to 
rudely shake anybody's faith in the origin of these venerable forms, 
we are content for the present to disturb them no further. ^* 

It is sufficiently evident from what has been already said that the 
introduction of "Christianity " made at first but little outward change 
in the customs and constitution of the Roman empire. The empire 

" Prescott, 35. That one of these days was called Wodensday is averred by Hum- 
boldt. *« Sir Stamford Raffles. 

" Bryant, Ancient Mythology, vi, 304, says the Goths at one time adopted the Ro- 
man week of nine days; but we can find no confirmation of this view. Dr. Samuel 
Pegge, in the "Gentleman's Magazine," 1812, vol. i, p. 625, published the facsimile 
of a Gothic runic calendar cut upon a a yardstick, similar to the calendar-sticks made 
by the Romans and to those still found in Sweden and Norway. It was used in the 
isle of lesel, (Ruhn or Rugen,) and Mohn. All the wooden calendars we have seen, 
as well as this one. are medieval and divide the week into seven days. The pagan 
calendar-sticks with five-day weeks, if any existed, have been long since destroyed. 

*® To put it briefly, every nine days in Rome, every seven in Buddhic India and in 
Judea, and every five in Gotland, the church received an offering, chaunted a benedic- 
tion, and patronized a fair, or festival. Upon this simple custom have been erected 
mountains of mythology. 

^' Gibbon, Dupuis, Herbert, Higgins, Brady and Hislop amply prove the Oriental 
origin of relic-worship, incense, images, pictures, candles, and other ecclesiastical 
"properties" and " personae." 



164 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

was Still the sacred empire, the emperor was still the sacred and deified 
emperor, the government was an hierarchy, and the people of Rome 
were divided into nobles, priests, citizens, foreigners and slaves. 
Religion, reduced in many instances to its most degraded form, was 
practiced by several hundred different sects, chief among whom were, 
First, the worshippers of the actual Sun and Planets; ^° Second, the 
worshippers of the Hindu and Greek incarnations; Third, the wor- 
shippers of the Mesopotamian gods; Fourth, the worshippers of the 
Homeric gods; Fifth, the worshippers of the Egyptian gods; Sixth, 
the worshippers of the Gaulish and Galatian gods; Seventh, the wor- 
shippers of the living emperors, as gods; Eighth, the Jews; Ninth, 
the Philosophers; and Tenth, the rising and all-embracing Roman 
Catholic church, whose religion, when purified and reformed, was 
destined to supercede all the others. 

But although few changes appeared on the surface, the most im- 
portant change was going on beneath. The churches, not because 
they had become christianized, but because they were united by an 
hierarchy, had feudalized nearly all the powers of the state and ab- 
sorbed the wealth of its citizens. The gorgeous structure of social 
caste which bore the stamp of Justinian, marked, not the beginning, 
but almost the maturity of that feudalism, which, planted like a 
canker in the Sacred constitution erected by Julius, had already eaten 
out the whole substance of the empire and left it to his successors 
little more than an empty shell. The process of feudalization renders 
it difficult to describe by any sweeping phrase the character of the 
motley population which the hammer of Christianity, with a swing of 
ages, was destined to slowly beat into some sort of homogeneity. It 
differed in Rome, which Vitellius had filled with Gothic and Sclavic 
soldiers, from its composition in Italy, where it was still composed of 
elements differing both in race, religion and language. It differed in 
Italy from the provinces, and in each of these, from the other. Ever 
since the reign of Julius Caesar, the inhabitants of the Roman empire 
had been obliged to accommodate themselves to a system of involved 
castes and feudal subordination; ever since the levity of Nero had 
sounded the death-knell to emperor- worship, the people had fallen into 

*" At Cremona, during the war for the succession between Vespasian and Vitellius, 
A.D. 6g, the Third Legion, on the field of battle, "paid their adoration to the rising 
Sun." Tacitus, Hist., in, 24. The worship of the Sun established by Elagabalus, 
Diocletian and Julian, and the prevalence of Mithraism and Dionysianism between 
the period of Augustus and the fourth century of our sera, are alluded to more at 
length in the author's "Worship of Augustus Caesar." 



CHRISTIANIZATION OF THE ROMAN INSTITUTES. 165 

religious anarchy; and ever since the reign of Alexander Severusthe 
empire had begun to lapse into proconsulships which resembled great 
fiefs and from which were destined to arise, in the distant future, the 
modern kingdoms of Europe. 

If it be asked what Christianity did before the time of Charlemagne 
toward checking the growth of feudalism, the answer is. Nothing; if 
it be asked what it did toward destroying irreligion and the idolatrous 
worship of images and relics, the answer is. Nothing; if it be asked 
what essential marks it left upon the pagan constitution of Rome, 
the answer is still Nothing. But if it be asked in what respects it has 
influenced European civilization, the answer is, in Everything. During 
the twelve centuries of its existence as an hierarchy, it put out the 
light of all other hierarchies, and then, with the sublime self-abnega- 
tion taught in the story of its Founder, it destroyed it own hierarchical 
character. Christianity was once a system of government; it is now 
a religion. Its pretended history, its human husk, has rotted away; 
its diviner essence remains. 



i66 



CHAPTER IX. 

RISE OF THE MEDIEVAL EMPIRE. 

Revolts of the Goths and Franks — Their aim was the overthrow, not of the temporal 
authority, but rather the ecclesiastical tyranny of the Basileus — When the revolts suc- 
ceeded, the Gothic and Frankish provinces again submitted to the Roman hierarchy, 
but refused to accord it either military service or ecclesiastical appointments — Efforts 
of the hierarchy to enforce these prerogatives — Cost of the success which attended 
these efforts — The Western church becomes Gothicised, while the Eastern church be- 
comes Hellenicised — Hence the Schism of the sixth and seventh centuries — The Ara- 
bian revolt — Its peculiarity — Its success — Loss of the Asian and African provinces — 
Loss of all the Eastern ecclesiastical lands and slaves and revenues — These losses, 
combined with religious schism, leads to the secession of the Roman See from the 
Greek Empire — Attitude of the Basileus and Pope before the secession — Image of 
Phocas worshipped at Rome — Iconolatry the immediate cause of the rupture — Ener- 
getic proceedings of Leo — Resistance of the See of Rome — Pepin is invoked to its 
aid — Terms of theCarlovingian-papal contract — Subjugation of the Lombards — Origin 
of the temporal power of the Latin popes — Death of Pepin — Accession of Charlemagne 
— Revolt of Desiderius — Lombardy again subjugated — Charlemagne crowned king at 
Rome — His conquests in Western Europe — Homage of the Western princes — Homage 
of the Pope — Preparations for the great event — Charlemagne crowned emperor at 
Rome. 

BY the Medieval, is meant the empire erected by the Latin pon- 
tificate and Pepin the Short, moulded into a temporal empire 
by Pepin and Charlemagne, but, after the death of the latter, con- 
verted into an hierarchical state by the See of Rome. This has been 
variously called the Frankish empire, the Roman empire, the Holy 
Roman empire, the Sacred empire, the Western empire, the German 
empire, etc. Frederic II., writing to Earl Cornwall, calls it "our Sa- 
cred Empire." None of these titles are sufficiently descriptive or 
comprehensive; most of them are misleading. Roman, Sacred and 
Holy Roman, * were properly titles of the empire whose cajittal was 
Constantinople ; Western is peculiarly applicable to the Lower empire ; 
whilst Frankish or German, for the name of an empire whose only 
charter was the Sacred constitution, and whose only real capital was 
Rome, is a misnomer, which, though it runs through all modern his- 

• Voltaire said it was neither Holy, nor Roman, nor an Empire; but here the philo- 
sopher was forgotten in the wit. 



RISE OF THE MEDIEVAL EMPIRE. 167 

tory, could only have emanated from partisans and Ghibellines. In 
entering upon a subject of so much contention as the practical status 
of this anomalous and shifting empire, it is important to avoid the 
use of any term which may prejudice the question; hence the choice 
of Medieval. 

In point of time the Medieval empire, roughly speaking, embraced 
the reigns of Pepin and Frederick II. ; more definitively, its duration 
extended from the assumption of sovereign power by Pepin, to the 
Fall of Constantinople in 1204; when substantially all that remained 
of the Eastern empire and the prerogatives of its sacred emperors 
became the prize, not of the pope who planned its downfall, nor of 
the Latin emperor whom he nominated, but of the feudal princes who 
actually achieved the conquest, and who down to that time had been 
subject to the divided and contentious authority of these great pow- 
ers. In other words, the Medieval, fell with the Sacred, empire. 

As pagan Rome toward its end, was governed for a brief interval 
by the exceptional institutes of Constantine, so the Medieval em- 
pire, shortly after its separate establishment in the West, was governed 
for a brief interval by the exceptional constitution of Charlemagne. 
These temporary phases of the imperial fundamental law have been 
purposely omitted from view. ^ Their consideration would only de- 
tain the reader and retard a narrative, which, covering as it does some 
twenty centuries of time, demands as much brevity as a due develop- 
ment of the argument will permit. In the present work the Medieval 
empire is regarded as consisting of Western Christendom, or all of 
Europe west of the Adriatic and Bothnian gulfs, omitting the pagan 
countries of the Baltic, and omitting Spain after it was conquered by 
the Arabians. 

The extent of the Medieval empire depends upon the view which 
is taken of the political relations between the Western provinces and 
the Sacred empire during the dark and medieval ages. It has pleased 
the vanity or patriotism of various modern writers to regard the 
countries to which they severally belonged — and by consequence, the 
other provinces of the Roman empire — as independent states, from 
the period of the Gothic revolts in the fourth and fifth centuries. 
This view, if true at all, is true only in a very limited sense, only in 
the sense that a feudalizing movement was always in progress and 
that the provinces were always being isolated more and more from 
the authority of the empire. The Gothic, properly Romano-Gothic, 

'Brief allusions to Constantine's institutes will be found in my "Ancient Britain," 

and elsewhere in the present work. 



l68 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

uprisings, produced little more change than to accelerate this move- 
ment. When those risings took place, the ancient custom of dis- 
patching proconsuls, vicars or legates from Rome to govern the 
provinces, had almost died away. The viceroys, by whatever name 
they were called, were many of them provincials and of barbarian or 
mixed origin. When the revolts ceased and purely Gothic or Frankish 
chieftains ruled in Britain, Gaul, Spain, Saxony, Germany and Italy, 
they ruled as viceroys of Rome, they coined money in its name, and 
they protected with Roman laws all who choosedto live under them. 
The revolts had rid those countries of direct military service to the 
empire and of the imperial prerogative of investiture. Beyond these 
matters, which were absolutely important, and beyond certain fiscal 
reforms which were relatively unimportant, it would be difficult to 
point out any substantial change in the long-time relations of those 
provinces to the Roman empire. Here and there breaks occur in the 
continuity of these relations; some Norsemen, fiercer than the rest, 
bade defiance to Rome, and perhaps for a short interval reigned as 
an absolute, though a petty, monarch. But the Sacred College soon 
got hold of such free-booters and either drove them back into feudal 
relations with the empire or else consigned them to convenient in- 
ternment in a penitential monastery. These subjects, however, have 
been sufficiently discussed in other parts of this work. ^ 

The Medieval empire owes its origin as much to the Arabian revolt 
of the seventh century as to those previous risings which had taken 
place under the Goths. It will be convenient to refer to these events 
in their proper chronological order. The earliest risings of the Goths 
and other northern barbarians had been prompted by the Roman 
conscription, which tore the youth of the provinces from their fami- 
lies and drafted them to distant lands, there either to die by the sword 
or become strangers to their homes and countries. The undue mul- 
tiplication of religious temples, priests, church-lands, benefices, liv- 
ings and appointments, or investitures, was the next form of oppres- 
sion that the barbarian world resented. The love of plunder no doubt 
largely contributed to swell the ranks of the malcontents and impel 
them in their rebellious career; but this was not the primary motive, 
or it would scarcely have enlisted the sympathy of those eminent and 
respectable provincials, who, though small in numbers, so powerfully 
contributed to the success of these rebellions. 

' For an example of the ingenious devices employed by the See of Rome in manu- 
facturing a barbarian origin for the institutes of Medieval Europe, see the praetaxation 
theory of Onuphrius in Chapter xi, of the present work. 



RISE OF THE MEDIEVAL EMPIRE. 169 

From the moment when the Gothic revolts succeeded in their ob- 
ject; from the moment when the Sacred emperor was obliged to yield 
the prerogative of appointing local bishops, priests and other minis- 
ters of (the Roman pagan) religion ; from the moment that the emperor 
renounced the right of conscription and perhaps also ceased the fur- 
ther granting of benefices to Italian ecclesiastics; from that moment 
the Sacred College, whether under pagan or Christian control, used 
the most active endeavours to recover by the arts of peace the au- 
thority which the empire had lost by the arbitrament of war. To 
these patriotic endeavours we may attribute the earliest missions sent 
by the Roman See to the northern barbarians. In the absence of the 
feudalizing tendency, which, at this period, pervaded the entire po- 
litical system of the empire, the See of Rome would probably have 
become a coordinate branch of the Sacred College at Constantinople. 
As it was, that branch formed a distinct sacerdotal caste, whose func- 
tions were confined to the Western provinces and who were connected 
with the Eastern, only through their superior lords, the bishops of 
Constantinople. When, about 376, the myth or doctrine of the Na- 
tivity, proposed by the Roman See, was communicated to the Sacred 
ColYege at Constantinople by one of its bishops, Gregory Nazianzen, 
it was objected to as a strange and unwelcome innovation, which 
might lead the faithful back into idolatry.* 

Separated, as this instance proves it was, from the centre of eccle- 
siastical influence, the See of Rome had to make a career of its own, 
a fact of which this very dogma of the Nativity affords an illustra- 
tion. Although with reference to Jesus, it was first adopted in Alex- 
andria, it proved to be so unsuited to the eastern provinces at that 
period, that it found no resting place until it crossed to Rome. The 
Armenian Christians, who were quite familiar with the Brahminical 
and Chaldean nativities or incarnations, refused the Christian one, on 
the strange ground that Christ had no birthday, because he was never 
actually born in the flesh and was a deity of the imagination, not of 
earth ; ^ the Byzantine Christians saw in the proposed birthday only 
a renewal of the (so-called) idolatrous rites which had distinguished 
the commemoration of Bruma; while the Judeans turned their stub- 
born backs upon it altogether. What the prejudiced East rejected, 
the more ingenuous West received. But it did not receive, without 
at the same time imparting. In that daily contact with the bar- 

* Smith's Die. Bible, word "Christmas." The date is not entirely convincing. 
'Theodoret. Other authorities, including Porphyry Coecilius in Minutius Felix, are 
cited in Michaelis, and Smith and Taylor's Diegesis, 253. 



lyo THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

barians, which was necessary to lend vitality to its work of evangel- 
ization, the See of Rome found it impossible to escape the influence 
of those very rites which it strove to eradicate from the practices 
of its western catechumen. The superior attainments of the Romans 
lent them great advantages in missionary work. They monopolized 
the arts of reading and writing, then but little known to the Goths, 
and without a more general knowledge of which, they were becom- 
ing each day more and more conscious that it was impossible to 
maintain their more recent attitude of quasi-independence.* More- 
over these arts were the keys to other arts, an intimate acquaint- 
ance with which was essential to conserve those valuable fruits of 
Roman prowess and industry to which the provincial princes had 
fallen heirs. 

But for all this, the barbarians did not receive Christianity as a 
gift from on high. To them it was a phase of the imperial power, and 
they never accepted it peacefully, nor without a valuable considera- 
tion. They had to be lured into it, coaxed or cajoled into it, tempted 
into it, married into it, bribed into it, or else forced into it. In all 
these efforts the Church had to yield something of principle in re- 
turn. The Christianity, as well as the imperialism, of this period, 
wore many coats, and underwent many mutations. Ignorance and 
idolatry are weeds which need a variety of tools to ensure their ex- 
termination. The new name of the church was Catholic, or univer- 
sal, and its motto was semper ubique et pro omnibus. In a previous 
chapter allusion was made to certain Gothic customs which are still 
preserved in the ceremonials or festivals of the Church. St. Augus- 
tine, the pioneer missionary to semi-Gothic Britain, was expressly 
commanded by Pope Gregory to make concessions to the pagan 
islanders. Accommodate your ceremonies to theirs, wrote the zeal- 
ous evangelist, and permit them to eat as much flesh to the glory of 
God, as formerly they did to the devil.' These concessions were 
carried so far that the Ten Commandments were reduced to six or 
or seven, by omitting the interdictions against the making and wor- 
shipping of images, * and by winking at piracy, polygamy and other 
well known tendencies of the Northmen. It was in this manner that, 
reciprocally, the Goths were Christianized, and the western church 
Gothicised. 

In dealing with the eastern provinces the See of Constantinople 
found itself influenced in a similar manner, though in a different 

' Gibbon, Chapter xxvii. ' Bede, lib. i, cap. 30. 

"Brady, Clav. Cal. and Henry, History of Britain. 



RISE OF THE MEDIEVAL EMPIRE. I7I 

direction. If it succeeded in planting a heavy crop of Christianity, 
it also reaped many local customs, some of which still survive in its 
festivals and ceremonies. The pre-Christian customs and beliefs, 
which the Christian church was obliged to adopt in Gaul or Britain, 
and the other pre-Christian customs and beliefs which it acquired 
from Asia and Africa, were not alike; hence even the orthodox 
creeds of the two principal ecclesiastical divisions of the empire did 
not and could not agree; and schism between them was inevitable.' 
This difference originated not only in the pagan customs of the peo- 
ple, it arose from the opposite views which they entertained con- 
cerning the origin of Christianity. The Greeks, aware that the new 
religion had succeeded to emperor-worship, refused to accept with 
it the mythology and prophecies of Judea, which the more distant 
Romans had been persuaded were essential to its perpetuity. The 
records of the government were in Constantinople, and any person 
who had access to them could have seen, for example, who were the 
real popes of Rome from Julius Csesar to Gratian. In Rome there 
was nothing; nothing but mythology, fable and miracle. The ancient 
city itself was twenty feet under ground, where it had long since 
been buried by Alaric, the duke of lUyria. 

Beside difference of faith and ceremonial, and apart from the strug- 
gle for ecclesiastical offices and livings, there were other circum- 
stances which impelled the See of Rome to secede from the rule of 
the Basileus. In the fifth and sixth centuries the religious sanctuaries 
and monasteries were filled with men anxious to avoid fighting on 
behalf of the ephemeral tyrants, who during this period filled the 
thrones of the slowly dissolving empire and its constituent feudal 
provinces. The refugees threw all their worldly possessions at the 
feet of the Church, asking only in return such protection and ex- 
emption from military service as the cloister and a religious life 

'It is perhaps hardly necessary to remind the reader that schism means literally a 
split. As the nature of an hierarchy is such that it never can be whole and is split, ab 
initio, it has been argued that it cannot be split afterwards; but this is a refinement 
hardly worth considering. Whatever its initial tendency to fly apart, the empire down 
to a certain period was ruled by a single authority. We are now venturing to describe 
what occurred afterwards. It is almost impossible to convey a just impression of the 
bitterness and ferocity of ecclesiastical schismatics. For teaching that " our Lord was 
produced from two natures before their union, but only one nature after their union, 
and that our Lord's body was not of the same substance with ourselves," Pope Leo I., 
whose ffira has been assigned to about the year 456, deposed Dioscorus, bishop of 
Alexandria, and appointed Proterius. This produced such discontent among the pious, 
that they elected as their spiritual guide Timotheus, a holy monk and presbyter; then 
they stabbed Proterius to death and ate him, raw! Evagrius, i, 9; 11. S. 



172 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

afforded.'" The ability of the Church to afford this protection varied 
according to locality. The western feudal princes — many of whom 
were already "Christians" and few or none of whom were unwilling 
to tolerate an ecclesiastical organization which they perceived was 
capable of exercising a more powerful restraint upon the barbarian 
inhabitants of their provinces than the worship of Ccesar or of 
Woden — were nevertheless tenacious of their military authority and 
their prerogative of investiture. At the Council of Orleans, which 
was convened by Clovis in 511, the last year of his reign, the bishops 
were forbidden by the king to ordain as priests any others than 
slaves, because priests were exempt from military service and the 
king needed that of all freemen." 

Through the diplomacy of St. Augustine and the influence of the 
king's Christian wife, King Ethelhert of Kent is said to have been 
converted to Christianity about the year 600. He consecrated 
churches in Canterbury, Rochester, and London, placing clerks and 
priests in one place and monks in another; granting to such churches 
the lands and benefices of their (pagan) predecessors for their sup- 
port. "In like manner also other kings made grants to other cathe- 
dral, prebendal and conventual churches, upon conditions which can 
be seen on inspection of their documents and the schedules of dona- 
tions. In no case did they make such grants without reserving to 
themselves for the public advantage three things (as the consider- 
ation for these gifts,) namely, military aid and the service of keeping 
the bridges and the citadel in proper repair." '* Such was the Court, 
— not the ecclesiastical — view of these grants. As to the pagan eccle- 
siastical property, it did not actually pass into the king's hands at all. 
About 680, Egfrid, king of Northumbria, having divided the bishop- 
ric of York and its benefices, manors, farms, etc., between two sees, 
Wilfrid, the bishop, whose wealth and magnificence exceeded that of 
the king himself, appealed to the Pope (Agatho) and carried his ap- 
peal in person to Rome. His case having been favourably considered 
by the Sacred College, Wilfrid hastened back to York, and triumph- 
antly presented the decree of the College to the king. The latter, 
indignant at this attempt to intefere with what he deemed a prerog- 

'"Evagrius. " Guizot, 11. 32. 

'^Considerations submitted to the King, Henry III., at a royal council called by 
him in London, in 1244, to protest against the heavy demands made by the Roman 
See, concerning the revenues of the English Churches, for which consult the Chroni- 
cle of Matthew Paris, sub anno. But Ethelred I.. King of Kent, made a large dona- 
tion of the lands of England freed from the Three Necessities. See elsewhere in the 
present work. 



RISE OF THE MEDIEVAL EMPIRE. 173 

ative of his sovereignty, committed Wilfrid to prison. He was, how- 
ever, subsequently restored to liberty.*^ 

In spite of the efforts of the Western princes to maintain their prerog- 
atives of military service and ecclesiastical investitures, the Church, 
either by inflaming their mutual animosities and keeping them divided, 
or by interning the pertinacious, in convenient monasteries, rendered 
these prerogatives null. Everywhere men crowded into the Church, and 
it was a bold hand that would venture to force them from its sanctu- 
aries. Everywhere it persisted in its claims to investitures, and little 
by little it prevailed. Wilfrid, banished from Northumbria, has only 
to enter Sussex, whose pious king bestows upon him the See of Chiches- 
ter and upon the Church a great portion of the peninsular of Selsea, 
which lies to the eastward of Portsmouth harbour, together with ' ' all 
the cattle and slaves upon it." The equally pious king of Wessex 
contributes a third part of the Isle of Wight. In 685 Wilfrid returns 
to Northumbria, whose new king, Alfrid, or Ealdfirth, confers upon 
him the bishopric of Hexham, the See of York and the monastery of 
Ripon. Clamouring for the twelve abbeys he had previously enjoyed, 
Wilfrid was again expelled. This time he goes to Mercia, whose pious 
king bestows upon him the See of Leicester. The pope reverses the 
sentence of the wicked Alfrid, and upon his supercession by the pious 
Ofred, a child of eight years, Wilfrid returns to Northumbria, and is 
invested with the bishopric of Hexham and the abbey of Ripon. '* 

This sort of ecclesiastical management, so efficacious in the West, 
was of little avail in the East. There the Church had not to deal with 
many little princes, whom it could playoff one against the other, but 
with a single monarch, who, notwithstanding the partial alienation of 
a considerable portion of his empire, was still powerful enough to 
maintain his hierarchical prerogatives over the remainder. Almost 
at the same moment of time that the provincial king Ethelbert re- 
served military service in his so-called grants of benefices to the 
Church, the emperor Maurice issued an edict forbidding all civil of- 
ficers from becoming clerks, or entering a monastery. This ordinance 
he sent to the pope of Rome with instructions that he should com- 
municate it to the Western parishes of the Sacred empire. Clovis 
had interdicted not merely civil officers, he had forbidden any free- 
man from entering the Church, But Clovis was a provincial king and 
the pontificate no doubt expected to find means, such as had been 
found in other cases, to defeat his decree. With the emperor Maurice, 
the case was entirely different. It was a command from the suzerain 
'^Bede. iv, 13. " Bede, iv, 16. 



174 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

of the pontificate itself, the Basileus, the Sacred emperor, the suc- 
cessor of Julius Caesar and Augustus, a command which, once com- 
municated to the "Western parishes," would undo the work and 
perhaps endanger those laborious accumulations, which to the covetous 
meant luxurious livings, and to the pious, the means of propagating 
the gospel. The sullen reply of Gregory to this command, while it 
marks the reverence and obedience which was still paid to the Sacred 
emperor, at the same time evinces the constraint of the pope, and 
constitutes one of the earliest steps which the Roman See made to- 
ward independence. Said the Roman pontiff to the Basileus, "Sub- 
mitting to thy order, I have sent this law to the various countries of 
the earth, but" — and thereupon follows a strong protest against it. 

While the Church was thus divided by its duty and its inclination, 
a horrible event relieved all its apprehensions. In 602 a monk ran 
through the streets of Constantinople, with a drawn sword, denouncing 
the emperor as a Marcionite heretic and calling down upon him the 
vengeance of God; a violent sedition was kindled, in which many of 
the troops were induced to join; the emperor retired for safety to a 
religious sanctuary; a vile, ignorant and deformed centurion of the 
guards, named Phocas, was now put forward by the priests and clothed 
by the rabble with the imperial purple; whereupon he gave orders to 
invade the imperial sanctuary ; the five sons of Maurice were butchered 
before the father's eyes; and his own death, in the midst of prayer, 
closed the terrible scene. When information of these circumstances 
was communicated to Rome, Gregory hailed them with joy, and after 
exposing the images of Phocas and his wife, Leontia, to the adoration 
of the clergy and municipality of Rome, he deposited them with re- 
ligious ceremonies in the palace of the Caesars. '^ 

Although Phocas proved more amenable to ecclesiastical discipline 

than his predecessor and victim, such was not the case with the em- 

" Compare the following letters of Pope Gregory, the one to Maurice, the other to 
Phocas, after he had murdered Maurice: To the Emperor Maurice, Gregory delares 
that this "tongue could not express the good he had received of the Almighty and his 
lord the emperor, that he thought himself bound in gratitude to pray incessantly for the 
life of his most pious and his most Christian lord, and that in return for the goodness of 
his most religious lord to him he could do no less than love the very ground on which 
he trod." To Phocas, a murderer, he wrote: " Let the heavens rejoice! let the earth leap 
for joy! let the whole people return thanks for so happy a change." To Phocas' wife 
(a strumpet,) he wrote: "What tongue can utter, what mind can conceive the thanks 
we owe to God, who has placed you on the throne to ease us of the yoke with which we 
have been hitherto so cruelly galled ? Let the angels give glory to God in heaven! Let 
men return thanks to God upon earth! for the republic is relieved and our sorrows are 
banished." Bower's Lives of the Popes, vol. 11, p. 536. 



RISE OF THE MEDIEVAL EMPIRE. 1 75 

peror Constans II., who reigned half a century later. Fora long time 
violent contentions had prevailed in the Church concerning the num- 
ber of wills and operations in Christ, one party maintaining the doc- 
trine of one will and one operation, another that of two wills and two 
operations, in which at this distance of time and in these days of a 
broader and more elevated Christianity, one perceives a distinction 
without much practical difference. Martin, who had been elevated 
to the See of Rome in 649, maintained the former doctrine; while the 
emperor (who was also the pontifex-maximus and therefore his apos- 
tolic superior) held the opposite. Martin, persisting in his schism, 
the emperor sent an armed force to Rome, which, seizing the person 
of the bishop, loaded him with chains and carried him to Constanti- 
nople, where he arrived in the autumn of 654. There he was tried 
before the Roman senate on a charge of heresy and crimen majes- 
tatis. After suffering much indignity, he was condemned by the 
Inquisition and sentenced to death, but afterwards reprieved and 
banished to the Crimea, where he died in 655, 

This treatment might have been borne by the Roman See from the 
Caesars when the latterwere in the plentitude of their power; it might 
even have been borne from their degenerate successors to the throne, 
so long as they retained the disposal of those numerous ecclesiastical 
livings into which the eastern empire was divided; but from an em- 
peror whose father's reign was marked by the loss of nearly every 
province of Asia and Africa, it was intolerable. Since the Arabian 
revolt, the Roman See, what with the firm hold it had acquired upon 
the affairs of the western princes and its great wealth in lands, cattle, 
slaves and revenues, had really become the guardian of the principal 
portion of the empire. Why, then, bow the knee any longer to a race 
of tyrants whose dominions, though they styled themselves Emperors 
of the World, had actually dwindled to the confines of Greece? The 
Basileus had even lost the power to defend the consecrated lands 
from confiscation by the Moslem. The empire had surrendered every- 
thing to the barbarians, even the places rendered sacred by scriptural 
narratives, the holy places of Galatia, the birth-place of the Saviour, 
the plains of Nazareth, the Sepulchre at Jerusalem. Was it not time 
to sever all relations between the only living propaganda of the faith 
and its moribund suzerain? An attempt to wrest from the Church 
one of its pagan customs decided the question. 

The surprising success of the-Moslem arms has hitherto been ac- 
counted for, by the theory of savage force. The conqueror of the 
East has been deoicted with the Koran in one hand and a drawn sword 



176 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

in the other, a fable that has descended to our own days and is still 
to be found among the embellishments of juvenile histories and geog 
raphies. But as Dozy, Lavoix and other eminent writers on Arabian 
history have justly remarked, this view does not account for the vast 
numbers of voluntary conversions that took place, nor for the joy 
with which whole populations welcomed the new dogma. Nor does it 
explain how a force of 120,000 fighting men, continually weakened 
by death and wounds and employing weapons inferior to those of their 
enemies, could have successfully overrun an extensive and populous 
empire defended by ships, forts, citadels and the best disciplined and 
strongest-armed troops in the world. There must have been a moral 
force behind. The Koran-and-sword was the natural explanation of 
defeated Roman commanders and fugitive troops; but this, though 
it might amuse the vulgar, could hardly have satisfied the imperial 
court. 

It was during the two sieges of Constantinople, the first under the 
caliph Moawiya, the second under Walid, '" that the imperial court 
enjoyed the earliest opportunity of becoming acquainted with the 
methods by which Moslem rule had been so rapidly diffused and will- 
ingly accepted in the whilom Roman provinces of Asia and Africa. 
It now appeared that prominent among these methods was the procla- 
mation of the Unity of God, and the interdiction of image worship. " 
Imbued, through this disclosure, with the conviction of its efficacy as 
a moral instrument, by which to recover the lost provinces of the 
empire, the emperor Leo, in the year 726, promulgated an edict which 
required that all images used in places of devotion throughout the 
empire, east and west, should be taken from the sanctuaries and altars 
and removed to such a height that while they might remain visible 
to the worshippers, they could not be employed, by means of touch- 
ing or kissing, as aids to a gross form of superstition. This was 
shortly afterwards followed by another edict, which proscribed the 
use of pictures in churches. A third edict, intended to remove the 

" In these sieges the art of the chemist was first employed to assist that of the ar- 
mourer, tactician, and military engineer. On both occasions the assailants were driven 
off by the use of Greek fire, a burning fluid which appears to have been composed 
chiefly of petroleum, probably from Baku. In the ceremonies of Bacchus torches were 
employed "composed of native sulphur and charcoal," which could be dipped in water 
without fear of being extinguished. Livy, xxxix, 13. This smells of gunpowder. 
The timely earthquake which repulsed the Gauls at Delphi, and was followed by a 
shower of rain, if not entirely destitute of truth, strengthens the same suspicion. 
Justin, lib. xxiv, fin. A mixture of sulphur and charcoal is also alluded to in another 
of the Classics. " See Chapter xvi. 



RISE OF THE MEDIEVAL EMPIRE. 177 

images altogether, was postponed until the reign of Leo's son, Con- 
stantine Copronymus. " 

Meanwhile the See of Rome was up in arms. It had protested in 
vain; the time had come for action. The churches of Italy and the 
West were declared independent and at once withdrawn from commun- 
ion with the * ' Greeks" ; the dioceses of Italy were advised or ordered 
to withhold payment of the imperial pontifical taxes, (in the northern 
provinces, known as Rome-scat,) and in order to resist any attempt 
at coercion on the part of the Basileus, negotiations were opened 
with Charles Martel, the warlike " Duke of the Franks," accompanied 
with an offer of the Roman proconsulship. '" It must not be supposed, 
with the vulgar, that this memorable revolution grew merely out of 
an attempt to reform an idle ceremony. The policy of Leo andCon- 
stantine Copronymus went much further than this; it struck, as that 
of Mahomet had struck, at the very foundation of the Roman religion. 
Ecclesiastical writers, who would have us believe that Christianity 
was always as pure as it is now, that the further back we look, the 
purer it was, and that it captured the Roman world, either by a nar- 
rative of remote and uninteresting miracles, or by the force of reason, 
are wholly unable to explain the causes of this revolution. If the 
worship of images in the eighth century was the mere formality into 
which it has since degenerated, how could the proposed abolition of 
images from the churches have been sufficient to precipitate the se- 
cession of the Roman See from the empire? Would such a proposal 
at the present time array the Christian world in arms? The idea is 
preposterous. And why so? Because the presence of images in 
churches, even among the most ignorant communities of Christendom, 

'^In 754 the Seventh General Council, as it is styled, composed of 338 bishops of 
Europe and Anatolia, met at Constantinople, and there formally condemned the wor- 
ship of images. This council was not recognized by the Romans. 

'^ Pepin of Heristal.a Roman comes palatini, had a wife named Plectruda, by whom 
he had a legitimate son, Grimoald. Pepin had also a concubine, Alphaida, by whom 
he had an illegitimate son, Charles (Martel). The latter murdered his brother 
Grimoald and was cast into prison for the crime, while Plectruda assumed a regency 
representing both the youthful Merovingian " king," (roi faineant.) Dagobert III., 
and the youthful comes palatini, her grandson and the son of Grimoald. An eccle- 
siastical sedition in favour of Charles released the latter from confinement and pro- 
claimed him subregulus, or Roman duke of the Franks. His party having secured the 
kingdom, he reigned over it as sole monarch, yet he permitted Dagobert III., Clo- 
taire IV., Chilperic II., and Thierry or Theodoric IV., to reign nominally as "kings' 
of the Merovingian Franks, during a portion of his own reign, i. c, from 716 to 737. 
Charles Martel died 741, after having greatly disappointed the clerical faction that 
raised him to power and gave him an honourable and immortal name. 



178 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

(Russia perhaps excepted,) has no longer the significance that it pos- 
sessed in ancient and medieval Rome. As explained elsewhere, this 
was a custom of the highest antiquity, derived from the ancient wor- 
ship of ancestors, a custom which was not only sanctified by time, 
but enjoined in that article of the Sacred constitution which deified 
the emperors, ordered them to be adored, and set up their images in 
the temples of religion. The worship that Mahomet actually abolished 
and that Leo the Isaurian attempted to abolish, was the same one 
against which both Britain and Judea had unsuccessfully revolted. 
" There is no God but the one God ! " cried these suffering provinces, 
but the Romans would not have it so, and the ultimate consequence 
was the entire loss to them of the eastern world when it embraced 
Islam. 

In the war which the Roman See had declared against the empire, 
the Exarchate of Ravenna as well the Pentapolis and Sicily remained 
faithful to the emperor Leo, under whose directions several attempts 
were made to seize the person of the pope, who was threatened to be 
transported in chains, like his predecessor Martin, to the foot of the 
imperial throne. But the vigilance and resources of the See of Rome 
not only defeated these projects, they fomented a feud in Ravenna, 
in an attempt to stifle which, the imperial exarch lost his life. To 
punish this deed and bring the Latin "pope" ■" to his senses, Leo 
sent a fleet and an army to the Adriatic; but these forces were de- 
feated by the insurgents; and the cause of iconolatrous Christianity 
prevailed. No immediate advantage was taken of this triumph by 
the See of Rome; it was not yet strong enough. Charles Martel, 
although he was the grandson of a Roman priest, had no thought 
of rebellion against the authority of the Sacred emperor. He had 
listened but coldly to the advances of the Latin pope, and had sent 
him no material aid. The emperor's offence was therefore affected 
to be regarded at Rome as a personal one and to be considered apart 
from his imperial and sacred offices. Leo and his son were still styled 
by the popes " Imperatores et Domini ; " and no opposition was made 
when Leo sent other exarchs to Ravenna to represent him and to 
govern in his name. The Latin pope awaited his opportunity; and 
this opportunity came with the almost simultaneous deaths, in 741, 
of Leo and Charles Martel. These events left to Carloman, (Martel's 

''** Eginhard.a German priest of this period, called the pope sometimes the Bishop of 
Rome, sometimes rector, or presbyter. Theodoret, a bishop of the fourth and fifth 
centuries, whose work received a good deal of subsequent polish, is made to style him, 
"My Lord." 



RISE OF THE MEDIEVAL EMPIRE. 



179 



eldest son,) the Roman duchy of Austrasia and the right bank of the 
Rhine, whilst Pepin the Younger, (born 715,) inherited, under the 
Roman government, Neustria, Burgundy and Provence. 

In 747 Carloman was successfully interned in a convent in Lom- 
bardy ; when Pepin, disregarding and usurping the rights of Carioman's 
sons, and probably under instructions or advice from Rome, seized 
the lordship of France, reigning as maire du palais conjointly with a 
Prankish phantom king (roi faineant) called Childeric III. In 752, 
and doubtless in accordance with further instructions from Rome, 
Childeric III. was also interned in a convent, and Pepin, after a mock 
show of being offered and accepted by the Franks, was anointed king, 
by Bishop Boniface, at Soissons. His part in the erection of the Med- 
ieval empire is related elsewhere. When this great event was ac- 
complished, Pepin abandoned himself to a life of luxury, of which 
perhaps the most singular episode was the appointment of one of his 
concubines as abbess to a convent of monks. 

In 768 Pepin instigated the assassination of the heroic Waifar, the 
vassal duke of Aquitaine,'^' whose dominion he annexed to the crown. 
He died during the same year, leaving the throne to his sons Carlo- 
man and Charles, or Charlemagne. "'' Dr. Robertson quotes a con- 
temporaneous text to prove that Pepin was elected king of the Franks ! 
The text runs as follows : " Pepinus rex, plus, per authoritatem papse 
et unctionem sancti chrismatis et electionem omnium Francorum in 
regni solio sublimatus est. " " If one part of this bit of clerical irony 
is to-be read demurely, why not the other, which attests Pepin's piety? 
It is difficult to decide which to admire most, the ingenuity and men- 
dacity of the medieval clerks, or the carelessness with which modern 
professors of history accept their false chronicles. 

Meanwhile, in 741, Constantine Copronymus had ascended the im- 
perial throne and renewed the war against images. In the same year 
Luitprand, an Arian Christian and the duke or ' ' king " of Lombardy, 
was instructed to unite his forces with those of the imperial exarch 
of Ravenna and march upon Spoleto and Rome. A falling out be- 
tween the allies dispersed this storm, but it broke out again, when, 
in 749, Astulphus succeeded his brother Rachis to the iron crown of 
Lombardy. This prince, taking advantage of the Arabian wars, in 
which the empire was at this time plunged, and ungrateful for the 

"'Acqutanise ducata politi sunt nomine tamen Francorum regum. Charter of Charles 
the Bald. '-''^ Chron. Fredigar. Continual, c. 135. 

*^ Clausula de Pepini consecratione ap. Bouquet, Recueil des Histor., torn, v p. 9. 
Robertson, Charles V., Note 38. 



l8o THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

good offices performed for him by the Latin See, boldly avowed him- 
self the enemy of both emperor and pope; and in 752, after subduing 
Ravenna and dispatching the exarch, he encamped under the walls 
of Rome and demanded as her ransom from assault, the tribute of a 
piece of gold, to be paid to him annually by each of her citizens, in- 
cluding, of course, the numerous adherents of the pope. " 

The time had now come for the move long contemplated by the 
Latin See. Beguiling the emperor with an appeal for aid, which he 
had no intention of accepting, and amusing Astulphus with the pre- 
tence of entreating his forbearance, the pope, Stephen IIL, took 
advantage of the opportunity, which the interview with the latter af- 
forded him, of quitting the beleaguered city ; then journeying with the 
utmost speed across the Alps, he appeared before his protege, ex- 
plained the critical situation of affairs and pointed out the advantages 
to be gained by immediate action. But a descent upon Italy was not 
a matter to be lightly considered, and Pepin very naturally enquired 
what terms the pope was prepared to offer. The answer was, the 
immediate control of the western church, the right of investiture in 
Gaul and its tributary states, and for the future, every possibility. 
While these negotiations were going on, Astulphus, learning where 
Stephen had gone, released Carloman from the convent of Monte 
Casino and induced him to undertake a mission of peace to Pepin. 
By this time the negotiants had concluded their compact. In it was 
comprised the conditions that Pepin should be absolved from his 
allegiance to the phantom king of the Merovingians, Childeric III., 
that the ceremony of his own coronation should be repeated by the 
pope in the church of St. Denis and that it should include Pepin's 
two sons, Charles, (Charlemagne,) and Carloman. " 

This memorable transaction took place in 754. Leaving his wife, 
Bertha, to keep an eye upon his brother Carloman, at Vienne, (Dau- 
phiny,) Pepin marched in the spring of 755, crossed the Alps, defeated 
the Lombards in the foothills, and at once laid siege to Pavia, within 
the walls of which place Astulphus had taken refuge. Foreseeing the 
triumph of his enemy, Astulphus offered to yield the fortifications and 
territory he had won and to acknowledge his suzerainty, provided 

^* "A piece of gold," with reference to the Roman Empire always meant a solidus, 
or bezant. For its weight, from time to time, see my " History of Monetary Systems." 

^^ Roi faineant, or idle king, was a soubriquet invented by the papacy. Phantom king 
is more expressive, but both are misnomers. These kings were the vassals of the 
Sacred Empire and governed under its authority. In the course of time the papacy 
reduced the Sacred Empire itself to a phantom. 



RISE OF THE MEDIEVAL EMPIRE. l8l 

Pep.n would evacuate Italy at once. These terms Pepin accepted. 
The territory recovered from Astulphus consisted of the greater por- 
tion of the Exarchate, the five cities of Rimini, Pesaro, Fano, Sinigaglia 
and Ancona, (called the Pentapolis,) and seventeen other towns, sit- 
uated chiefly on the Adriatic. All this was now (755) bestowed upon 
the pope, to be held as a fief of Pepin, a fief whose peculiar character 
is briefly discussed at foot. From this date commenced what is called 
the "temporal kingdom " of the pope. "^ 

Pepin, although he had become the actual sovereign and suzerain 
of a considerable portion of Italy and had adopted or accepted the 
titles of king of the Franks, (rex Francorum,) and Roman exarch and 
patrician, evinced no design of a further rupture with the Greek em- 
pire. On the contrary, his acceptance of the title of exarch and 
patrician, which latter, though bestowed by the pope, could only have 
a value during the existence of the Sacred empire; his suppression of 
the Merovingian gold coins, and his own abstention from coining 
gold, all prove that he regarded his kingdom, notwithstanding its 
enlargement, as a sort of younger brother to the empire. Accepting 
forty distinguished hostages from his new vassal, Astulphus, Pepin 
returned with the main portion of his army to France, where he at 
once made preparations to bring the affairs of his kingdom into ac- 
cord with his new circumstances and those of the fiefs which he had 
erected in Italy. In the same year, 755, he abolished the Merovin- 
gian coins, which down to that time had circulated in France, melted 
the Arabian dirhems coined by his father, " struck new silver deniers, 
of which twelve went to the quarter-solidus or gold shilling of the 

'^ That the Exarchate and Pentapolis were fiefs of the Empire no one disputes; that 
after subjugating them Pepin or Charlemagne held them as fiefs will not be disputed; 
and that the pope performed numerous acts of feudal subjection and homage to the 
Carlovingians, as suzerains of these fiefs, is susceptible of overwhelming proof. Yet 
there was a peculiarity about these fiefs, which, had the ecclesiastics been as good 
lawyers as were the Carlovingians, they might have saved the pontificate of the tenth 
century from the guilt of forging the "Decretals of Isidore." A fief is a grant of land 
or other temporality, upon conditions, which conditions, if not observed by the bene- 
ficiary, render the grant forfeit to the suzerain. But a grant to the Lord can never be 
forfeit, for the Lord (of Rome) taketh, but he never giveth up anything. Hence a 
fief granted to Rome became practically a donation. However, the forged Deed at- 
tributed to Isidore included something more than the fief of the Ecclesiastical State, 
which proves that the ecclesiastics, though they may have been poor lawyers, were ac- 
complished conveyancers. 

''' These were the moneta soldaren, a Languedoc Latin phrase for "Sultan's Money." 
The pieces were of silver, and weighed 38 to 39 English grains each The Arabian 
dirhems weighed 43 grains. Money and Civilization, pp. 22, 186 



l82 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

Basileus, and thus permanently restored to France the Roman mone- 
tary system of jC^ s. d. 

In the midst of these preparations he-was again called to arms. No 
sooner was it ascertained that Pepin was safely back in France than 
Astulphus, breathing vengeance, had again laid siege to Rome. It 
is claimed that on this occasion the pope, fearing to fatigue the zeal 
of his ally, sent to Pepin the Forged Letter of St. Peter, which en- 
dowed him, centuries in advance, with riches, victory and paradise, 
upon condition of guarding and protecting St. Peter's tomb at Rome ; 
on the other hand, it threatened him with eternal damnation if he re- 
fused. To this appeal, however unwilling he might otherwise have been 
to again undertake so costly an enterprise, it was impossible for Pepin 
to turn a deaf ear. Once more he crossed the Alps, once more he de- 
feated Astulphus and shut him up in Pavia, and once more he delivered 
the ' 'tomb of St. Peter" and the budding authority of the ' ' pope " from 
the perils of an Arian conquest. The war which opened so briskly 
was soon brought to an end by the sudden death of Astulphus, occa- 
sioned, it was said, by a fall from his horse, in 756. He was succeeded 
by Desiderius, his principal commander, a person acceptable to the 
pope. "^^ After adjusting the terms of a peace with Desiderius, Pepin 
returned to France. It is from the foundation of the fief of Ravenna 
that the Medieval Empire took its rise; not from the crowning of 
Charlemagne, which last-named event was merely the sequel of the 
former. 

The division of the empire was now complete. In vain had Con- 
stantine Copronymus sent an embassy to Pepin laden with presents, 
among them one of those harmonious instruments in the invention 
or manipulation of which Rome has contrived to maintain an envi- 
able supremacy down even to the present day. " The cunning Frank 
was proof against such blandishments, and although the emperor's 
ambassadors were treated with the profoundest respect and were 
doubtless charged with dutiful assurances that the prerogatives of 
the Sacred monarch would never be infringed by the king of the 

^^ Muratori, rer. Script. Ital., vol, 11, p. 3. 

^' Tacitus mentions a hand-organ as early as the reign of Nero. An ancient monument 
of Rome, depicted in Hawkins' History of Music, represents a keyed organ into which 
a man is blowing with a bellows, and upon which a woman is playing. Among the terra 
cotta antiquities exhumed by Mr. Barker at Tarsus was the figure of a man in Roman 
costume playing an organ. Lares and Penates, p. 260. The period of these antiquities 
is placed by Barker in the first century. On p. 189 he admits it may have been so late 
as the third century. The organ presented to Pepin had seven stops. It was placed 
in the Church of St. Corneille, at Compeigne. Morell, History of France, p. 78. 



RISE OF THE MEDIEVAL EMPIRE. 183 

Franks, it was evidently the intention of Pepin to keep what he had 
got, peaceably if. he could, forcibly if he must. The theory of some 
modern writers, that when Charlemagne entered Rome in 774 he did 
so as exarch and patrician, the one a title implying vassalage to the 
emperor, the other implying vassalage to the pope, is true only to 
this extent, that both Pepin and Charlemagne were exarchs and 
patricians. They took everything that was offered to them, and much 
that was not. As exarchs of the emperor they respected his ancient 
title and authority; as patricians appointed by the clerico-municipal 
conclave, which the wily pontiff had inflated with the title of Roman 
Senate, they wore the title for what it was worth. Dealing know- 
ingly with Greek duplicity and medieval Roman humbug and intrigue, 
the founders of the Carlovingian dynasty proved themselves a match 
for both. 

Upon the death of Pepin, in 768, his sons, Charlemagne and Carlo- 
man, were crowned joint-sovereigns. One of the first acts of the 
former was to strengthen his claim to the fief of Lombardy and Ra- 
venna, by marrying Desiderata, '" the daughter of Desiderius, Duke 
of Lombardy. This took place in 769, or in the early part of 770. 
Charlemagne was already married " to Himeltruda, or at least lived 
with her and had a son by her named Pepin; so that, especially in 
view of what happened afterwards, his nuptials with Desiderata must 
be regarded with a strong suspicion of politics. Within the first year 
of his marriage, intelligence seems to have reached him from Rome 
that Desiderius was his enemy, perhaps that the latter was making 
preparations to surrender the pope's newly acquired fief to the Bas- 
ileus. The young wife's alleged sterility is an obvious pretence. " 
At all events, Charlemagne, in 771, put her away, sent her to Pavia, 
got his marriage dissolved by the bishops, and the same year married 
Hildegarde, the daughter of a Suabian noble. Nor was this all that 
happened this year ; Carloman died suddenly and was buried at Rheims, 
without making any provision regarding the succession. The flight 
of his terrified widow with her children to Pavia, points to the insti- 
gators, if not also the authors, of her husband's death. " Nor was 
even Pavia safe; for Hunald of Aquitaine, a fugitive from his own 

^** Variously called Desiderata, Desideria, Bertha, (the same as Charlemagne's mother,) 
and Hermingard or Irmingard. 

^' So the pope held. Eginhard, who, however, is always a partial witness for his hero, 
says the woman was a concubine. ^^ Mon. Sangellens, lib. 11, cap. 26. 

^'^ In 769 Carloman was so imprudent as to disapprove of the papal settlement, and 
in 770 he corresponded frequently with Desiderius, who had seized upon some portion 
of the Exarchate. Anastasius, vit. Stephen III. 



184 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

country, having in vain sought redress from the pope against Charle- 
magne, repaired to Pavia, where he was mysteriously killed by a stone 
thrown by some unknown hand. Sigebert's brief apology of apos- 
tatavit for this crime, whilst it may excuse the assassin, also serves 
to point out the class to which he belonged, or by whom he was em- 
ployed. It is abundantly evident that mischief was afloat, that the 
instigators were in Rome, ^* and that when sides had to be taken by 
the various parties affected, they instinctively sought refuge either 
with the Catholic Charlemagne, or the Arian Desiderius. 

When, in 772, Hadrian succeeded to the Latin See, Desiderius 
made a formal request that the children of Carloman should be ac- 
knowledged and consecrated as the rightful sovereigns of that part 
of France which their father had possessed during their lives. To 
propitiate the pontiff, Desiderius agreed to waive further dispute and 
to surrender that portion of the Exarchate which he was accused of 
having wrested from Rome. Instead of carrying out this proposal, 
Hadrian at once sent word to Charlemagne. Hearing of this, Desiderius 
placed himself at the head of his army, seized Faienza and Com- 
machio, and then laid siege to Rome. Nothing had been heard from 
Charlemagne, whom it afterwards appeared was at Thionville, taking 
part in festivities which were being celebrated for the birth of his 
son Charles, by Hildegarde. The land approaches to Rome were all 
blockaded by Desiderius. In this difificulty Hadrian despatched a 
courier by way of the Tiber and the sea. This messenger having 
safely reached Marseilles, posted in haste to Charlemagne, and laid 
before him the danger which threatened the Latin See. To these 

** The ' 'pope" objects to Charlemagne's marriage, (Codex Carolinus XLV,) the ' 'pope" 
approves the marriage, the pope condemns the marriage, the bishops pronounce the 
divorce, the bishops remarry the widower. Saint Fulda negotiates with Tassilio of 
Bavaria; in short the ecclesiastical hand is in everything. At one time Sergius, the 
pope's legate to Charles and Carloman, is " Sergium fidellisimum nostrum," at an- 
other he is strangled in prison by the pope's order. Affiarta, who had been employed 
by Stephen, is honoured by Hadrian, who at the same time sends secret orders to the 
Bishop of Ravenna to execute him at sight. The gentle pope in one letter calls the 
Lombards leprosi and fcententissimi, and stigmatizes their friendship as pollution. 
(Codex Car. Ep. xlv,) whilst in the very next letter Desiderius, their king, is styled 
excellentissimus filius noster, and he is overwhelmed with praises. At the same time 
Charlemagne is warned to beware his treachery. The character of other moves in the 
game betrays the same players. Superfluous or annoying persons, though in the prime 
of life, when they are not removed by some sudden and dastardly act of Providence, 
are sure to be found interned in a convent. The reader will find the proofs of this 
assertion in the author's work on "Ancient Britain," in which the names and rank of 
the interned persons and the places of their internment are given at length. 



RISE OF THE MEDIEVAL EiMPIRE. 185 

representations, and to the inducements and promises which doubt- 
less accompanied them, the king lent an attentive ear, and a bargain 
having been struck, preparations were at once ordered for a cam- 
paign of relief. But while these military preparations were being made 
by Charlemagne, that is to say during the winter of 772-3, thekingsent 
three embassies to Desiderius proposing terms of accommodation. 
He offered to pay Desiderius 14,000 solidi if he would give up the 
war and restore the cities he had taken. '^ We have no information as 
to what Charlemagne proposed for Carloman's children, or for his own 
repudiated wife. Whatever they were, Desiderius rejected them, the 
siege of Rome went on, and Charlemagne, in the summer of 773, began 
a sudden march over Mount Jovis, (now the great St. Bernard,) and 
Mount Cenis. He had accomplished the worst part of this journey in 
safety before intelligence of his movement reached the Lombardian 
duke. Hastily abandoning the siege of Rome, the latter, after vainly 
attempting to stop Charlemagne's forces at the pass of La Cluse, re- 
treated to Pavia, and from a besieger, he became besieged. The de- 
fence of Verona, whither for greater safety he had sent the wife, 
(Giberga,) and children of Carloman, was entrusted to his son 
Adalgisus and a Prankish noble named Autcarius. Learning of this, 
Charlemagne, after leaving a sufficient force to invest Pavia, marched 
to Verona, which, after a brief resistance, capitulated to him. 
Adalgisus escaped to Pisa, and thence to Constantinople, where we 
hear of him again. Giberga and her children disappeared forever." 
Returning to Pavia, Charlemagne pressed the siege for more than a 
year, meanwhile corresponding frequently with Rome. Having sent 
for his wife and children, he left Pavia,still besieged, in the summer 
of 774, and journeyed to Rome, accompanied by an immense con- 
course of priests, nobles and soldiers. Thirty miles from the city 
he was met by a numerous and festive deputation from the "pope". 
Here Charlemagne put off his military tunic, and arrayed himself in 
all the splendour of ceremonial robes, gold, and precious jewels. 
Entering the capital, he passed in triumphal procession to the church 
of St, Peter's, where he met and embraced the pope; received from 
him homage as king of the Franks and Lombardy," and confirmed 

^^ Anastasius, vit. Hadrian. Paulus Diaconus, Hist. Lombard. Supplement. 

^* Velly and Le Beau attempt to identify the second son of Carloman with Siagrius, 
Bishop of Nice in 777. It reads like the story of the Iron Mask. 

^^ Charlemagne assumed this title before the fall of Pavia, a fact which James re- 
gards as unimportant, but which we have ventured to think has some bearing upon 
the situation. 



l86 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

the grants made to him by his father, Pepin/* On this occasion 
Charlemagne struck coins in his own name at Rome, he required the 
"pope" and others to swear allegiance to him and his family, he ap- 
pointed officers of the law, and by them justice was administered. 
In short, he arranged, both by assertion and practice, those evi- 
dences and conditions of sovereign authority, which, as we shall see 
in the sequel, were destined never to be permanently settled. A-fter 
this he left the capital and returned to the siege of Pavia, which he 
now prepared to reduce by famine. It surrendered to his forces in the 
summer of 774. A coin or medal ascribed to Charlemagne on this 
occasion bears the device Devicto Desiderio et Papia recepto; with 
the date. Desiderius, with his wife and daughter, the divorced wife 
of Charlemagne, were sent into France, where they were interned in 
the monastery of Corbie, after which the conqueror returned to his 
proper kingdom. The subjugation of the Arian kingdom of Lom- 
bardy and Charlemagne's subsequent crusades against moslem Spain 
and pagan Saxony and Hungary, clearly evince the nature of the 
compact between Charlemagne and the pope. The king was to con- 
quer and command; the pope was to obey and enjoy the benefices. 
It was a compact between lion and jackal. 

In 775, Hildebrand, duke of Spoleto, (whose territories Charle- 
magne had annexed as an appanage to the dominions of the Latin 
See,) and Rodgard, duke of Friuli, made a league together, whose ob- 
ject it was to recall Adalgisus from Constantinople and reconquer 
Lombardy in the name of the Emperor, Leo IV., the son and suc- 
cessor of Constantine. The tardiness of Leo in supporting this 
scheme enabled Hadrian to send repeated messages to Charlemagne, 
who, in 776, again traversed the Alps and descended into Italy. Ad- 
vancing at once to Friuli he took that place, beheaded Rodgard, 
returned to Treviso, which was betrayed to his forces by a Roman 
priest named Peter, (who was rewarded for the act with the bishop- 
ric of Verdun,) and having garrisoned these and other towns in Lom- 
bardy with Frankish troops, returned at once to France, on the 
frontiers of which the indomitable Saxons had again made a hostile 
demonstration. 

The year 777 was marked by the league of the Saxon leader, Witi- 
kind, with Sigifrid, king of Denmark, and by the overtures to Charle- 

'* Every phase of this subject has been fiercely disputed. The number of works 
written pro and con upon the nature of these relations would form a large library. 
The coins decide the controversy. Pope Hadrian coined, as a vassal and in the name 
of Charlemagne, in the year 772. 



RISE OF THE MEDIEVAL EMPIRE. 187 

magne of Ibn-al-Arabi, the Saracen emir of Aragon or Saragossa, 
who offered to "hold" his territories from the "Emperor" of the 
Franks,rather than from the hated Caliph of Cordova. A medal with 
the device, Capta excisaque Pampeluna, attests Charlemagne's con- 
quest of the Spanish March, and the resistance and fall of Pampe- 
luna, in 778; the rest of the country, as far as the Ebro, having 
quietly submitted to the conquerer. The memorable defeat of 
Charlemagne's rear guard at Roncesvalles, (RoscidaVallis,) marks the 
revenge of the Aquitaines for the murders of Waifar and Hunald.'^ 

In 779, letters passed between Charlemagne and Hadrian, con- 
cerning the slave trade and the irregularities of the Italian clergy, 
which sufficiently attest the assumption of sovereignty on the part of 
the former and the willing submission of the latter. *" Hildebrand, 
the whilom rebellious duke of Spoleto, also paid homage to Charle- 
magne the same year."" In 780, Charlemagne, accompanied by sev- 
eral of his younger children, whom he desired to be consecrated by 
the hands of the pope, again entered Italy, and in order to make 
preparations for the ceremony, took up his residence at Pavia. " 
Here Hadrian informed him that a league inimical to the interests 
of the nascent empire had been made between Arichis, duke of 
Beneventum, and Tassilio, duke of Bavaria, both of whom had mar- 
ried daughters of Desiderius, some time before the monastic intern- 
ment of the latter; whereupon Charlemagne took measures to win 
the parties back. to their fealty. While employed in this matter, that 
is to say, during the winter of 780-1, news came of the death of the 
sovereign-pontiff, Leo IV., and the accession as regent or joint- 
sovereign, of his widow Irene, a young and beautiful Greek, and an 
inveterate image-worshipper. 

The Sacred Empire had not yet lost all its footing in Italy. Ter- 
racina, Naples, and Calabria were still faithful, and Beneventum had 
proved itself ready to revolt from Prankish dominion. Nor had 
Charlemagne assumed any title that implied defiance to Constanti- 
nople. The road apparently remained open to reconciliation, and 
Irene took this road by sending friendly messages to the king of the 
Franks and the bishop of Rome. These were followed soon after by 
two embassadors, Constantine and Hamulus, who demanded the 

^' The battle of Roncesvalles was won by the Gascons and Basques. The Goths 
had no share in the fight, and the Saracens none of the spoil. James, 231, n. 

^^ Codex Carol inus, Epist. lxv. ^' Annales Loiseliani; Annales Mettensis. 

*^ The ceremony took place in 781. Carloman, whose name was changed to Pepin, 
was consecrated king of Italy; Louis, as king of Aquitaine. 



l88 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

hand of Rotruda, the eldest daughter of Charlemagne, (a girl of 
eight years,) for Irene's son, Constantine V., then ten years old. 
Had this proposal been submitted to the Latin See, it is abun- 
dantly evident from what had gone before that it would have been at 
once rejected. The Frankish king could afford to turn the incident 
to advantage. As for his daughter's concern in the matter, that was 
of no consequence. He acceded to the proposal without hesitation. 
It was only a promise. It relinquished nothing, and yet might serve 
to crush the hopes of Adalgisus, secure peace on his eastern fron- 
tiers, and afford him time to ripen his father's project of a junior 
empire. Rotruda was in consequence pledged to Constantine, and 
the eunuch Elisseus was permitted to remain near the young bride, to 
instruct her in the language and customs of her future court. Re- 
turning to France in 781, Charlemagne for several years pursued a 
war of extermination against the Norsemen." 

In 786, he returned to Italy, where he compelled the Duke of 
Beneventum, whose fealty Hadrian had impugned, to place his 
(Charlemagne's) name upon his coins, as a public and well under- 
stood mark of the latter's suzerainty and the duke's vassalage.*^ His 
next act was to summon to his presence the imperial embassador, 
to whom he intimated that the contemolated marriage between his 
daughter and Irene's son was no longer possible. When this message 
reached Constantinople, it, of course, produced profound indigna- 
tion. It led in the following year, 787-8, to another attempt to re- 
conquer the Exarchate with the assistance of Arichis and Tassilio, 
the dukes of Beneventum and Bavaria. Providence, ever on the 
alert to defend the titles of the "pope" to his temporal possession, 
suddenly spirited away both Arichis and his eldest son; and we hear 
of them no more. By a strange coincidence Tassilio and his wife, 
Luitbirga, a daughter of Desiderius, were both interned in a convent, 
and thus all the local leaders, actual, or prospective, of this move- 
ment, were suppressed. Irene, nothing daunted, lands a force in Italy 
under John and Adalgisus," and attempts to recover the Exarchate, 
but her army is met, fought and totally overthrown by the forces of 
Charlemagne, who now reigns undisputed master of the peninsular. 

In 794, (and upon charges preferred by a priest,) Pepin, the 

*^The Tilian annals, written before 808, call the Danes, Norsemen — Northemanni. 
They were associated with the Saxons in this war. 

** Le Blanc, Traite des Monnois, p. 100, 4to, ed, 

*^ The son of Desiderius, After this defeat Adalgisus completely disappeared and 
was probably interned in a convent. James, 325. 



RISE OF THE MEDIEVAL EMPIRE. 189 

natural son of Charlemagne by Himiltruda, is interned in a mon- 
astery. In 795, Pope Hadrian dies and is succeeded by Pope Leo, 
who in the following year sends to Charlemagne the keys and ban- 
ner of St. Peter as marks of homage to his lord and suzerain the 
king of France and Italy."" Alfonso II., (the Chaste,) king of Leon 
and Asturias, also does him homage, so does Eardulp, or Ardulp, 
king of Northumbria, and so do other kings of Britain," of whom 
more in another place. In short, as the necessary consequence of 
the pope's submission to him, Charlemagne became the lawful and 
acknowledged sovereign, and Defender of the Faith of the Catholic 
world. To be called Augustus Caesar, and have an imperial crown 
fitted to his head, were ceremonies whose fulfillment might well 
await an auspicious moment or a favourable opportunity. Such an 
one occurred in the year 800. 

An alleged attempt was made to abduct the Latin pope. He was 
seized in the streets of Rome, in the midst of a religious procession, 
that of the Greater Litany, and hastily borne to the monastery of St. 
Erasmus, where he was locked up. This circumstance has been greatly 
exaggerated. Some say that an attempt was made to blind him, others 
that both his eyes and tongue were removed, and that his recovered 
sight and speech were due to a miracle. The only undisputed cir- 
cumstances are that he was abducted and borne to a monastery, that 
his eyes were good enough to afterwards enable him to pass through an 
unguarded window and escape to Charlemagne's camp at Paderborn, 
and his tongue sufficiently fluent to tell his own story to that crafty 

^^ Shortly after this time, about 801, the caliph Ilaroun-al-Raschid in response to 
an expression of Charlemagne's solicitude concerning the Christian inhabitants of 
Jerusalem, courteously sent him the keys and banner either of that city or of the 
Holy Sepulchre, bidding him to govern it as he pleased. This action was evidently noth- 
ing more than a piece of politeness, but it so closely resembled that of Pope Leo that 
it has been employed to throw a colour upon the latter, by regarding this also as a 
mere formality. But such an argument will not do; for the circumstances were totally 
different. Charlemagne was the conqueror and sovereign of Italy, his father had do- 
nated and he himself had confirmed, the temporality of the pope; whereas, on the con- 
trary, Charlemagne had never set foot in Palestine, and he neither possessed nor 
claimed any rights there. If the vassalage of the pope rested upon this circumstance 
alone, it might be worth a more extended examination, but such is not the case. 
Charlemagne assumed and exercised sovereign control of Rome and the fiefs of Lom- 
bardy and the Exarchate; the pope and the dukes of Lombardy, Beneventum, etc., 
swore allegiance to him. The pope not only sent Charlemagne his keys and ensign, 
he struck coins in the king's name, ("Hadrianus Papa 772,") he submitted to be tried 
before him at St. Peter's, and he anointed, bowed down to, and even adored his per- 
son. If these are not acts of subordination and feudal homage, then there is no mean- 
ing to these terms. *' Eginhard, cap. xvi; James, p. 465. 



igo THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

monarch. The authors of the abduction are unknown. It was charsfed 
upon Campulus and Paschal, two of Leo's rivals for the pontificate 
in the Sacred College, but judging from the time and public place 
selected for its commission, the ease and rapidity of Leo's escape, 
and the momentous consequences of his journey across the Alps, it 
has all the appearance of having been committed at the suggestion 
of the pontiff himself. However this may be, the return of the pope 
to Italy was made the occasion to march an army thither and to send 
forward a vast number of nobles and prelates, destined no doubt to 
take part in the ceremony that Charlemagne and Leo had arranged. "* 
The king soon followed, accompanied by another army. As he ap- 
proached the city of Rome he was met at Lamentana by the pope, 
and the next day their combined processions entered the capital, where 
every preparation had been made for their joyous reception. Before 
the final act of this pretty drama was performed, it was necessary to 
clear the pope of certain counter-charges which Campulus and Paschal, 
the accused cardinals, had brought against him. For this purpose an 
ecclesiastical court was convened at St. Peter's for the trial of Leo. 
This court consisted of all the high dignitaries of the Church and prob- 
ably included the French ecclesiastics, whose assemblage at Rome 
had been ordered from Paderborn. Over this court Charlemagne 
presided in person as sovereign and supreme judge, and at this court, 
Leo, making no objection to its jurisdiction, pleaded not guilty. " 
No accusers appearing in person, and the pope having purged him- 
self by a solemn oath of any part in the offences which had been im- 
puted to him by the now absent Campulus and Paschal, he was unani- 
mously declared innocent; and judgment was accordingly pronounced 
by the king. ^" 

On Brumalia, or Christmas Day, A. D. 800, Charlemagne, attired 

*^ It is as amusing to read James' heated denial of Charlemagne's obvious intention to 
be crowned Emperor of Rome, as it is to observe the ill dissembled surprise of that in- 
genious monarch himself, when Leo, like another Marc Antony, placed the imperial 
crown upon his head, "I have sought in vain for the slightest suspicion of the kind in 
the older historians either of France or Italy, " says Mr. James, who appears to forget that 
the older historians were subject to a censorship which permitted nothing to be published 
that conflicted with the policy and views of Rome. " Really, Leo, you take me by 
surprise," is the sentiment, though not the words, which he attributes to the bashful 
Charlemagne, who has come to the ceremony fully attended both by his nobles and 
his family, completely attired and bejewelled as an emperor, and prepared with a vast 
array of imperial presents. ^' Anastasius, vit. Leonis III. 

'" Anastasius gives the pope's oath in the following words: "Quia de istis falsis 
criminibus, quae super me imposuerunt Romani, qui inique me persecuti sunt, scien- 
tiam non habeo; nee talia igisse me cognosce." 



RISE OF THE MEDIEVAL EMPIRE. 



191 



in the long purple-bordered robe of a Roman patrician, and sur- 
rounded by his family, his nobles, his guards, and a vast concourse 
of ecclesiastics, soldiers and citizens, many of whom were employed 
in flinging a largess to the multitude through whom they passed, ap- 
peared at St. Peter's church and took part in the religious ceremonial 
of the day. As the king was about to rise from a kneeling attitude 
before the altar, Leo advanced towards him, and raising an imperial 
crown, he placed it on the head of the monarch, amidst a cry that 
suddenly burst forth from the assembled multitude, "Long life and 
victory to Charles Augustus, crowned by God, great and pacific Em- 
peror of the Romans ! " Although Eginhard and many later historians 
inform us that Charlemagne was quite taken aback with this action, 
he neither refused the crown nor protested against the title, but on 
the contrary, accepted both. Not only this, he accepted the title 
formally, he took the imperial oath, and permitted himself to be 
anointed from head to foot with holy oil, and to be adored by the 
faith'ful Leo in the manner anciently employed towards Julius, Au- 
gustus Caesar and their imperio-pontifical successors. His eldest son, 
Charles, was also anointed with him. These ceremonies having been 
duly performed, the officers of the court advanced and introduced a 
new and magnificent function. By the greatest piece of good fortune 
a quantity of tables, made of solid silver, vases and chalices of gold, 
crowns and paterae, enriched with gems, and other beautiful and 
valuable articles, had been unconsciously brought to St. Peter's by 
the royal attendants; and these were now distributed to the assem- 
blage. New cries rent the air, and these, caught up by the people 
without, were carried along the entire route through which the im- 
perial cortege swept from the church to the palace, "Long live 
Carolus Magnus, the Emperor of Rome! " *' 

^' The details in the text are gathered from Eginhard, the Tilian and Loiselian annals, 
Paulus Dioconus, Anastasius, Flodoardus, etc. The two last declare that the son of 
Charlemagne was anointed with him. Gaillard and the Memoirs of the Academy agree 
in believing that it was the eldest son. The adoration of Leo is attested by Eginhard 
and all the other annalists, while the anointment is certified by Anastasius Theophanes. 



192 



CHAPTER X. 



THE LOST TREATY OF SELTZ. 



The religion of the Roman empire was reflected in its triune constituents — Attitude 
and relations of the Three Powers after the Treaty of Seltz — Division of dominion 
and authority — Partition of Italy — Divisible and unital powers — The Greek empire 
retains its ancient prerogatives — The Frankish empire acknowledges the Basileus as 
head of the Church — The Roman pontificate becomes a fief of the Franks — Reasons 
why the latter kept on good terms with the Basileus — Death of Charlemagne — Acces- 
sion of Louis the Pious — Suppression of the Treaty of Seltz — Appearance of the False 
Decretals — Under this instrument the spiritual and temporal powers of the Frankish 
empire were practically merged — Bargain between the Latin See and Charlemagne to 
recognize the latter as the Augustus or sovereign-pontiff and Caesar, or emperor, of 
the Western world. 

THE religion of the empire was now reflected in its form. The 
moment the Imperial Crown was placed upon the head of 
Charlemagne there became apparently three Roman empires, the 
Elder, the Junior, and the Spiritual. In reality, or as nearly in reality 
as the situation can be viewed through the delusive medium of an 
hierarchy already eight centuries on its way toward extinction, there 
was but one empire, and the capital of that one was Constantinople. 
Mountains of books have been written to explain other mysteries of 
the hierarchical system, but none have been written to elucidate the 
position of the Basileus. The moral is plain. That which involves 
a tiresome explanation, is probably not true. The explanations have, 
at all events, never been satisfactory. When society is established^ 
upon the basis of fable and imposture it is impossible to reduce its 
institutes to an exact measure of law. Such was the basis upon which 
Roman society had been established by Julius Csesar and upon which 
it still stood. To apply the principles of law to such a condition of 
affairs is sheer waste of effort. 'The best we can do with hierarchical 
institutes, is to reduce them to the fact. What powers or preroga- , 
tives did the emperor of the Franks actually exercise? What pre-^^ 
rogatives did the pope exercise; and what prerogatives, if any, dul ^ 
they exercise together? Even when these questions are answered 
we shall find that we are dealing with an hierarchical constitution, 



THE LOST TREATY OF SELTZ. I93 

which continually recast its feudal skin, shifted its ground, and wrig- 
gled out of sight. ' Before Charlemagne's imperial coronation, the 
youthful Constantine VI. wrote him a letter, which, could it now be 
referred to, would probably throw great light upon the mutual atti- 
tude of the parties at this period. But it is no longer extant. Irene 
is said to have marked her high displeasure at this letter by blinding 
her son; but as she held views which did not suit the theories of the 
honourable men who have written her history, it is quite possible that 
the unnatural story which has come to us through them, in common 
with much else that they have written, is a mere invention, motives 
and all. ' 

In 803 Charlemagne concluded a treaty with Nicephorus I., which 
had been commenced under Irene and which doubtless succinctly 
defined the mutual relations of their respective empires. ' This treaty, 
copies of which were deposited in Constantinople, Aix la Chapelle 
and Rome, is also lost. Many miracles are recorded in the books of 
this period, but the greatest miracle of all is not recorded in any of 
them. It is the corruption, mutilation, or destruction of every lit- 
erary evidence concerning the origin, history, and legal relations of 
the Latin pontificate; and the survival of the fables invented tosup- 

' The relations of the Latin See to the Basileus down to the seventh century are 
shown by the attitude of Gregory toward the emperor Maurice and the usurper Phocas. 
The present attempt to rehabilitate the lost Treaty of Seltz may serve to indicate these 
relations down to the ninth century. Then follows a blank of two centuries. In the 
eleventh century the efforts of the Latin See, now the papacy, to overthrow the Bas- 
ileus with the aid of the heretical Roger, prove that the suzerainty of the Basileus was 
still asserted and perhaps maintained. It was not until 1204, when Constantinople 
fell beneath the Latin arms and its records were destroyed, that the papacy became 
entirely independent. The collection of alms in the West by the pope for the " Eastern 
empire," mentioned by Matthew Paris, has little significance, because the Eastern 
emperor at that time, (reign of Baldwin,) was a mere tail to the papal kite. 

' The political custom — for such it was — and operation of blinding, was derived 
from the East, and is only one of the ten thousand horrible fruits of hierarchical gov- 
ernment and policy. The operation was performed by passing a hot brass basin before 
the eyes, without touching or otherwise injuring them. It is fully described by the 
Jewish traveller Texeira, in his work entitled "Voyages de Texeira, ou I'histoire des 
Rois de Perse," translated from the Portuguese by C. Cotolendi, Paris, 1681. It is 
also described by Amador de Los Rios, in " Estudios sobre los Judios de Espaiia," 
Madrid, 1848, p. 557; and by Duarte Barbosa in his " Description of the Coasts of the 
East, in 1514," London, translated for and published by the Hakluyt Society, 1866, 
p. 44, note. 

^ " He made with them the most binding Treaty possible that there might be no oc- 
casion of offence between them." Eginhard, IV, 16. The date and place of this famous 
Treaty are supplied by James, p. 460, who contents himself with briefly observing that 
" The Treaty of Peace between Charlemagne and Nicephorus has not been preserved." 



194 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

ply their place. " In order to determine these relations, historians 
have been obliged to make use of the fragmentary and perverted 
evidence that remains; and it is in the selection of these materials 
and the use made of them, that they have differed most widely. With 
some historians the position of the Greek empire has not been regarded 
as important. For example, Mr. Hallam devotes just five pages out 
of 720 to the history of this, the original, the parent empire, between 
the eighth and thirteenth centuries. How the ghosts of the book 
forgers and mutilators of the ninth century must have chuckled with 
triumph when the " History of the Middle Ages " was printed! Mr. 
Bryce also slights the subject and has strangely overlooked the sig- 
nificant fact that the medieval chroniclers from Bede to Matthew 
Paris as uniformly and strenuously insisted upon the Greek origin of 
the western nations as now the scripturalists and verbalists contend 
for their Aryan origin.* 

As a matter of fact the Greek empire is the pivot of all European 
history down to the fall of Constantinople. Until the "barbarian 
revolts" its armies had held the world in awe, its navies swept the 
sea, its laws were enforced and its customs observed, from India to 
the Atlantic ocean; its temples were reared in every clime, its re- 
ligious rites were performed under every sky. Is it to be believed 
that all this ceased or changed with the success of Mahomet, the se- 
cession of the pope, or the invasion of Lombardy by Pepin? Not 
the mutilated parchments of antiquity, but the monuments which 
archaeologists have dug up for us, shall answer this question. If the 
Empire was weak, it was not the weakness of a sparse or enervated 
population; it was due to its hierarchical and feudal government. If 
it was drifting toward dissolution, it was still of such important di- 
mensions that it proved a work of centuries to dispose of its remains. 
Even after its military power ceased to be respected; after Goth, 
Moslem and papal crusader had successively narrowed its frontiers or 
laid waste its territory, yet its laws, customs and imperial prerogatives 
continued to govern all Christendom. The drama of medieval Eu^ 
rope, as viewed from the Latin pontifical standpoint, is like the play 

* Among these fables and forgeries is probably the " Rescript " published by Jacques 
Bernard. 

^ As shown in a note to Chapter vi herein, Mr. Buckle very clearly marked this fact 
without perceiving its entire significance. On the suppositious descent of the Britons 
from Priam and ^neas he refers to Matthew of Westminster, and the letter of Edward 
to Pope Boniface; and he follows this with an immense array of other evidences; but 
nowhere does he ascribe the circumstance to the inflence of the Sacred (Greek) empire 
nor to the religious myths conserved by the Greek and Roman writers. 



THE LOST TREATY OF SELTZ. I95 

of Hamlet, with the ghost displayed in every scene and the king left 
out entirely. 

Foremost among any array of materials for determining the rela- 
tive position of the three great fragments into which the ancient 
empire had been split by the secession of the Latin pontificate and 
the erection of the Frankish empire, must be the Sacred constitution. 
Next must be the military resources of the Greek emperor, which 
were still sufficiently formidable to control the central provinces, (the 
Balkan peninsular,) Dalmatia and parts of Italy and, in the following 
century, to recover from the Moslem the entire province of Anatolia, 
(including Galatia,) with parts of Syria and Armenia. The policy of 
Charlemagne is an important contribution to such materials. His 
assiduous cultivation of friendly relations with Haroun al Raschid, 
the powerful and sinister neighbour of the Greeks; his desire to unite 
the Greek and Frankish empires by marrying such a demon of cruelty 
as the empress Irene is described to have been; his remarkable ab- 
stention from enriching his upstart nobility with the illustrious titles 
of patrician, consul, prsefect and duke, titles some of which his father 
had accepted from Constantinople, and which he himself had worn and 
cast aside; his unwillingness, whether from fear, fatigue or respect, to 
attack or molest the remaining dominions of the Greek empire in Italy f 
these and other facts and circumstances indicate that in the Settle- 
ment of 803 the politic Charles was content to disregard the Form, 
provided he was left free to mould the Substance of his newly created 
empire. More definitively, they indicate that in order to secure the 
quiet possession of the Frankish empire and the enjoyment of the 
Catholic religion, undisturbed by the military interference, diplomacy, 
or intrigue of the Greeks, Charles consented to regard the Basileus 
as still the head of the Christian church. 

Although the Church afterwards canonized Charlemagne as a 
saint, his orthodoxy was merely of the sort which belongs to con- 
querors and diplomats; for while the pontificate upheld the worship 
of images at Rome, he presided over a council at Frankfort, (A. D. 
794,) which denounced this very practice as impious. Therefore 
there is nothing improbable in the supposition advanced. Charle- 
magne laid no claims to being himself the head of the Christian 
church. He certainly could not have held the pope to be the head, 

* Mr. James attributes it to fear. He says that Charlemagne could not afford to 
make an enemy of the Basileus. But as he risked his enmity in conquering and de- 
priving him of Lombardy and the Exarchate, there must have been another motive for 
not attacking Naples Calabria and Sicily, 



196 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

since the pope was his vassal who had done homage to him, and 
moreover was an image-worshipper, and, according to the council 
of Frankfort, an heretic. 

Unless there were always to be two Christian cosmogonies, two 
calendars, two bibles and two sets of prophets, predictions, in- 
terpretations, miracles, relics, verifications, celebrations and festi- 
vals, there could not be two heads of an universal Church. And if 
there were to be but one head, upon whose shoulders could it rest 
with such propriety as upon those whereon it had always rested? 
Was not the authority of Csesar repeatedly recognized and enjoined 
in the Holy Scriptures? Was Caesar not still entitled to the things 
that were Caesar's? Subject to those limitations which an altered 
state of affairs had rendered necessary, did not Cassar still enjoy 
the prerogative to enroll and tax the world ? And who was it that 
had the hardihood, the power or the authority to disregard these 
solemn injunctions and fly in the face of an universal belief, by set- 
ting up an additional or a different head for the Christian church? 
Why did the Greek court refuse the hand of Irene to Charlemagne 
and thus miss an opportunity to reunite and reestablish the Roman 
Empire, if it did not fear to lose in such a marriage that attribute, 
still claimed at Constantinople, without which the restored Empire, 
though Roman in name, would have been in reality merely an empire of 
Franks?' And what attribute could this be but the sacred character 
of the Basileus ? Was this character not inscribed upon thousands 
of marble tablets and millions of coins; was it not graven in the 
minds and hearts of fifty generations of men, entwined into all the 
customs of private life, and imbedded in the very language of 
Christendom? 

The statement which appears in Eginhard that the Greek embassa- 
dorswere permitted to allude to Charlemagne as "Imperatorum eum 
et Basileum appellantes" is, as it stands, simply incredible, and is 
contradicted by the style afterwards used in addressing his son and 
successor, which was "Imperatori Francorum."® Imperator was the 
usual title of any victorious military commander, but Basileus was 

' Gibbon throws some doubt on this occurrence because it is not mentioned by the 
Latin writers. But it is related by Theophanes and other Greek writers of this period 
and there is nothing improbable about it. 

* Nicephorus II. declared it scandalous to call the western prince, emperor." He 
refused to acknowledge Otto I. as anything but "king of the Lombards. ' Luitprand, 
Legatio Constantinopolitana. Isaac II. addressed Frederick I. as ' chief prince of 
Alemannia." However, what sovereigns choose to call themselves, or one another, is 
by itself poor evidence of their actual relations. 



THE LOST TREATY OF SELTZ. I97 

reserved for the Sacred emperor.' Charlemagne never pretended to 
have inherited, and he never wore the sacerdotal veil of Constan- 
tine. The Decretals of Isidore were not yet forged. Who then was 
the head of the Christian Church, who was pontifex-maximus in 
the year 803, unless it was the Emperor of the Roman, mis-called the 
Eastern empire ? '" 

The Roman Empire had been divided by Diocletian and by Con- 
stantine, yet these sovereigns had not divided the sacred office of 
pontifex-maximus. That was undivisible, and so were those pecu- 
liar prerogatives, such as the regulation of the calendar, the grant- 
ing of high titles, and the coining of gold, which belonged to it, and 
were invested with a sacerdotal character. What more natural than 
to follow those hallowed precedents in the settlement or treaty of 
the year 803? 

Every circumstance, every consideration, even the subsequent 
miraculous loss of all three copies of the Treaty itself, leads to the 
belief that it recognized the Sacred character of the Basileus. When 
we come to consider the archaeological evidences, we shall find this 
belief amply corroborated." 

To counterpoise those concessions to the Basileus which, although 
forced upon the Frankish emperor by unavoidable circumstances 
and considerations, were nevertheless too important to be made 
without a show of reluctance, he probably, in the Treaty, insisted 
upon the solemn investment of the Roman pontificate, with full 
power over all religious temples, priests, privileges, rites and cere- 
monies in the Western world, except the prerogative of altering the 
calendar, or the position of gold in the coinage system; for, as a 
matter of fact, we know that such power, with such exceptions, was 
thenceforth exercised at Rome, and never in fact resisted else- 

' Yet even this was not always clearly understood. Basil I., having reproached 
Louis II., emperor of the West, about 878, with calling himself Basileus, the latter 
replied that it was only the Greek for rex and did not mean anything more. Bryce, 
I91-2. Edred of Wessex, (tenth century,) called himself Ceesere Totius Britannise, 
but he probably no better understood the meaning of Caesar than Louis II. did that 
of Basileus. 

*" Manuel I., about the middle of the twefth century invited pope Alexander TIL, 
when the latter was worsted by Frederick, to return to the allegiance of his rightful 
sovereign. Bryce, 193. 

" The Eastern Church was a thorn in the side of the papacy and the Eastern em- 
perors never ceased to deny their (the western emperors') right to the imperial name. 
The coronation of Charles was in their eyes an act of unholy rebellion; his successors 
were barbarian intruders, ignorant of the laws and usages of the ancient state. 
Bryce, 191. 



198 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

where. '^ This power included control over the worship of images, 
the canonization of minor gods or saints, the imposition of tithes, etc. 
On the other hand, we know that as a matter of fact and until the 
fall of Constantinople, the calendar was regulated and the coinage of 
gold was strictly monopolized by the Basileus. 

In reference to territory, Eginhard says that in the Treaty, (of 803,) 
the Basileus conceded Istria, Croatia, and Dalmatia. This must be 
understood to include only the northern and interior portions of these 
countries, where they border on Hungary; because, in 806, the Greek 
patrician, Nicetas, commanding a powerful fleet under the Emperor 
Nicephorus, appeared in the Adriatic Gulf to assume control of the 
Dalmatian ports, and Pepin, the third son of Charlemagne," probably 
upon instructions from his father, conceded the authority assumed 
by the Greeks. As Nicetas, during the negotiation of this claim, re- 
mained quietly at anchor in the harbour of Venice, it is also reason- 
able to conclude that the duke of Dalmatia remained faithful to the 
Empire., In 807, Pepin made an attempt to overrun the territories 
of Venice; but although successful on the mainland he was repulsed 
from the islands by the combined fleets of the Greeks and Venetians; 
a proof of their alliance, if not of their feudal relation. It is probably 
safe to assume that the Treaty of 803 left the Greek Empire in pos- 
session of Sicily, Calabria, Naples, the eastern shores of the Adriatic, 
and the Venetian Islands. Beyond these two articles it does not seem 
practicable at present to rehabilitate the Lost Treaty of Seltz. There 
can now be discerned only the indistinct outlines of the remaining 
rights and relations which this treaty affirmed, and these appear to 
have been somewhat as follows: 

I. — The Roman (Greek) empire was the parent of the Prankish 
empire. The Frankish monarch, whether duke, king, or emperor, 
whether he paid homage and tribute, or not, was subordinate in 
rank to the Basileus; at best, a son or younger brother. Something 
of this sort is to be gleaned from the reluctant lines of Charlemagne's 
subservient biographer. Says Eginhard: " He, (Charlemagne,) bore 
very quietly the displeasure of the Roman emperors, who were ex- 

'^ No attempt was made by the Latin pontificate to alter either the calendar or the 
coinage until after the Fall of Constantinople. The earlier alterations of the calendar, 
though sometimes ascribed to Rome, appear to have been made in Constantinople. 
This may be due to the fact that after the removal of the capital to Byzantium (after- 
wards called Constantinople) it took the name of Rome. All the known calendrical 
alterations are described in the author's " Augustus Caesar." 

'^Charlemagne had two sons named Pepin; his first and third. See the Index to 
the present volume. 



THE LOST TREATY OF SELTZ. 199 

ceedingly indignant at this assumption of the imperial title, but their 
anger was overcome by his great affability, sending them frequent 
embassies, and in his letters to them styling them his brothers." 
Evidence of the superior rank conceded to the empire of the Basileus 
also appears in the edicts of Otto II., who styled himself "Greek by 
birthright, Roman by conquest. " Somewhat similar relations had re- 
sulted nearly three centuries before, from the wars between the em- 
pire and revolted Persia. "Such was the superiority of Chosroes, 
that whilst he treated the Roman ministers with insolence and con- 
tempt, he obtained the most unprecedented honours for his own em- 
bassadors at the imperial court. The successor of Cyrus assumed the 
majesty of the eastern Sun, and graciously permitted his younger 
brother^ Justinian, to reign over the West with the pale and reflected 
splendour of the Moon." (Gibbon, iv, 264.) Indeed, the Perpetual 
Peace between Chosroes and Justinian, A. D. 533, might in some 
respects have furnished the model for the Treaty made in 803, be 
tween Nicephorus and Charlemagne. To the Basileus, indeed t ) 
all Christians, the Roman empire was not only undivided, it was 
indivisible. Although founded upon earth, its head was in the clouds; 
its Sacred Emperor, though no longer a god, was the high priest of 
Christendom, and therefore God's vicegerent. If in consequence of 
the Moslem wars in the East, the Basileus found it expedient to 
temporarily yield the secular government of the barbarous West, yet 
he still retained that spiritual dominion over it, which neither time, 
distance, enemies, nor other obstacles, could invalidate. 

II. — The Frankish empire was not independent of the Roman 
(Greek) empire. This is proved by certain prerogatives which con- 
tinued to be exercised by the Basileus, both under the laws of his 
own dominions and of the western empire, for example the granting 
of the highest titles of nobility, such as exarch, patrician and duke, 
the jus legationis, the calendar, the coinage of gold, and the regula- 
tion of the ratio of value between gold and silver. After the Treaty 
of Seltz the titles mentioned were always derived from the Basileus; 
the western princes did not bestow them until after the Fall of Con- 
stantinople. The calendar remained with the Basileus. No gold was 
coined, nor was any ratio permanently fixed by any Christian prince, 
other than the Basileus, until after this event. These prerogatives 
belonged to the sacred office of the Basileus, and their continued ex- 
ercise by that potentate is a proof that his high-priesthood of the 
Church was acknowledged and conceded in the Treaty of 803. These 
are circumstances, which, if our views are well founded, afford a 



200 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

sufficient reason for the suppression of the Treaty, by the Latin See." 
But although the various evidences adduced in these pages go to 
prove that under the Treaty, the emperor of the East retained the 
spiritual dominion of all Christendom, including the West, it is 
abundantly evident that to the Frankish emperor was conceded the 
temporal paramountship and subsuzerainty of the latter. This para- 
mountship included the Roman pontificate. Down to Gregory, the 
popes of Rome had done homage to the Basileus. Leo changed this 
custom, and did intermediate homage to Charlemagne; and, until they 
succeeded in subverting and reversing these relations, his successors 
in the Latin See did homage to the successors of Charlemagne. 

IIL — From the date of the great Schism, or rather since 755, the 
Latin See was confessedly a fief of the Frankish empire. This was a 
position that ill requited the valuable services which the Bishop of 
Rome had rendered to Pepin and Charlemagne, and ill befitted either 
the wealth, influence or ambition of the Latin See. Bearing in mind 
this consideration and the irrepressible instincts derived from its 
hierarchical origin, it cannot be supposed that this See divested 
itself of any means by which it might hope to divide the authority 
of its present suzerain, in order to govern his dominions. Among 
these means were the education of Charlemagne's sons, and the 
practice of ecclesiastical imposture. In case of failure, there was the 
Basileus to fall back upon. The ghostly training of Louis the Pious, 
the destruction of the Treaty, and the forging of the Decretals, 
were not the work of a day; and it is difficult to believe that the 

'* There are several reasons for believing that the prerogative of gold was expressly 
conceded to the Basileus in the Treaty of Seltz. I, The Merovingian princes struck 
gold until the seventh century.but always under the authority of the Basileus. II, Pepin 
having no such authority and not being yet prepared to defy the Basileus, struck no 
gold. Ill, Charlemagne having acquired both temporal and spiritual power enough 
to threaten the assertion of independent empire, began to strike gold, but as a matter 
of fact, when the Treaty of Seltz was ratified, he stopped. IV, Save a single doubtful 
solidus in the Paris collection, (one ascribed to Louis the Pious,) there are no gold 
coins of the Frankish or Medieval empire between the reigns of Charlemagne and 
Louis IX., a period of more than four hundred years. V, Neither Charlemagne nor 
the bishop of Rome were directly interested in the Oriental trade, at that period of vital 
importance to the Basileus. VI, The Latin See did not want a Frankish Basileus, but 
an emperor, subject to some extrinsic limitations of power; in order that it might hope 
to eventually govern him. These limitations, including the gold coinage, it could afford 
to concede to the Eastern Basileus. VII, The temporal dominions of the Latin See 
produced neither gold nor silver. So far as that See is concerned the coinage was there- 
fore purely sacerdotal and political. VIII, As a matter of fact all Christendom con- 
tinued to accept, circulate and recognize as full legal-tender, the gold coins of Byzantium, 
down to the thirteenth century. 



THE LOST TREATY OF SELTZ. 20I 

desperate design which these measures were intended to promote, 
would ever have been ventured upon, had not the Latin See previ- 
ously been impelled to concede the spiritual dominion of the Basil- 
eus. This concession was adroitly turned to account in the Forged 
Decretals. These purported to be a donation from Constantine I., 
to the Bishop of Rome, of both the spiritual and temporal dominion 
of the western world. But how would this false grant have read, 
even to the intellectually benumbed Louis, had the Bishop of Rome 
in the Settlement of 803, and while yet ignorant of the existence of 
this magnificent Donation, refused to acknowledge the spiritual do- 
minion of Constantine's lawful successor, the Basileus? Indeed, the 
forgery itself almost proves the case; for had not Charlemagne and 
the Latin bishop conceded spiritual dominion to the Basileus in the 
Treaty of 803, no such forgery would have been necessary. It is a work 
of supererogation to steal one's own property. That Louis the Pious 
was mere putty in the hands of the Bishop is proved by his consent 
to be interned in a convent; and there can be little doubt that had 
it been prepared during his lifetime, and had he been required to 
do so, he would have signed the Forged Donation itself, and thus 
made it a genuine one. But the forgery was for other eyes and cov- 
ered other dominions than his; it was a warrant to resist the spiritual 
claims of the Basileus, and a chart for the guidance of the western 
vassals. ^^ 

'^ Gibbon, chapter XLix, after warning his readers that the Vatican and Lateran 
were an arsenal and manufacture of forgeries, assigns the Forged Decretals to a period 
"before the end of the eighth century," as follows: " This memorable donation was 
introduced to the world by an epistle of Adrian the first, who exhorts Charlemagne to 
imitate the liberality and revive the name of the great Constantine." It does not appear 
to have occurred to the historian that this epistle of Adrian was itself forged, yet that 
such was the fact seems to have been the opinion of Renault and is certainly that of 
Bryce, (p. 157,) who assigns the Forged Decretals to a period subsequent to Charle- 
magne's reign. This view is supported not only by the reasons given elsewhere through- 
out this work, but also by the consideration that the bishop of Rome had too often 
and too publicly performed homage to Charlemagne to render it likely that he would 
have ventured, at least during the lifetime of that doughty hero, to set up such an im- 
pudent claim as these Decretals contain; seeing that his mitre and probably also his 
life would have paid the penalty of his temerity. The Forgery was a decree purporting 
to have been issued by Constantine I., which conferred upon the Latin See a complete 
title to the free and perpetual sovereignty of Rome, Italy and the Provinces of the 
West, the right to sway the sceptre, to wear the purple, and to command the homage 
due to Caesar. This imposture, together with some sixty-odd other spurious decretals 
and canons, was formerly attributed to Bishop Isidore, of Seville, but, as to the de- 
cretals in question, such could not be the case, for that voluminous writer died in 636. 
Whoever forged the decretals they were submitted to, and approved and issued by, 



202 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

The mutual jealousy of Charlemagne and the Latin bishop, the 
injunctions of Holy Scripture, and those superstitions of Christianity 
which they both shared, were of themselves quite enough to prove 
that at the famous Settlement of 803 entire spiritual domain over 
the West as well as the East was accorded, at least in theory, by all 
parties, to the Basileus. When to these general considerations are 
added the special ones above adduced, the conclusion that such was 
the case becomes almost irrefragable. With the claim of dominion 
over the West, which the Latin See asserted by producing the Forged 
Decretals, and the alternate admission and rejection of that claim 
by the monarchs who succeeded Charlemagne, commences a new 
phase in the evolution of the Medieval Empire, in whose constitu- 
tion, for the sake of brevity and perspicuity, it has been determined 
to treat its spiritual and temporal powers as merged; the Basileus 
meanwhile retaining the prerogatives expressly conceded to him in 
the Settlement of Seltz. 

the Council of the Lateran, some time during the tenth or eleventh centuries. By this 
time the bishopric or pontificate had sufficiently harrassed and stupefied the weak 
monarchs who succeeded Charlemagne, to prepare a favourable reception for their lit- 
erary work. For more than a century it passed unquestioned. Doubts were first thrown 
upon its validity in a private law-suit which sprang up in the early part of the twelfth 
century, and what the lawyers suspected, a Roman patriot verified. In 1440 Lauren- 
tius Valla so effectually drove his pen through it that churchmen themselves tacitly 
admitted the imposture, and Ariosto, in a poem, (the Orlando xxxiv, 80,) which had 
obtained the license of Leo X., ventured to find the apocryphal gift of Charlemagne — 
in the Moon! Yet, as Gibbon tersely observes, the edifice continued to subsist, though 
the foundations were long since undermined. 



203 



CHAPTER XI. 

CONSTITUTION OF THE MEDIEVAL EMPIRE. 

Lines of the constitution blurred by feudalism and shifted by pontifical encroach- 
ment — A clear view only to be obtained by disregarding the operation of these influ- 
ences — The Worship of Csesar — Feudal system — Sacred College and pontifex-maximus 
— Monachism — Canonization and Sanctuaries — Sacred Writings — Succession to the 
throne — Infallibility — Crimen Majestatis — Inquisition — Excommunication — Right of 
assemblage — Legislature — Juridical system — Education — Censorial and Consular pow- 
ers — Revenue and Expenditure — Treasure Trove — Mines — Coinage — Legal-Tender — 
Lands, wills and conveyances — Titles of nobility — Caste — Slavery — Provinces — Free 
Cities — Fairs — Right of war, peace and alliance — Trial by jury — Calendar — Foreign 
ambassadors and the jus legationis — Trade corporations — Navigation laws — Public 
Notaries — Doctors of Law — Bankers. 

THE constitution of the Medieval empire is not to be gathered 
from the texts preserved by the Vatican. * It cannot be too 
often repeated that the entire stream of history has been corrupted 
by ecclesiastics, who, so far from being Christians, have violated all 
the tenets upon which that religion stands. Every modern historian 
has discovered these corruptions, every one has either boldly or tim- 
idly condeinned them, and yet there is always a new generation of 
unread people to whom these discoveries have to be again unfolded 

' Hence it should not be surprising that the Medieval constitution outlined by Pfeffel, 
and afterwards by Dr. Robertson, is a mere caricature, bearing no resemblance at all 
to the original. But it is certainly disheartening to find that the Roman manufacturers 
of false testimony have succeeded in misleading so critical and recent an historian as 
Mr. Bryce, where he says, (p. 190,) that " the great mass of the people (of Europe during 
the twelfth century) knew nothing of the Greeks, not even by name." The historian 
may have gone further and claimed that the "great mass " of the people knew of noth- 
ing whatever beyond the limits of the petty feudal estates to which they were attached; 
but the "great mass" of those who took any part at all in public affairs, even to the 
mercenary soldiers who drew their monthly pay in sacred besants, could not have been 
ignorant of the existence and name of the Greeks. The fact is that the people of the 
twelfth century had the numismatic monuments of the Basileus continually before their 
eyes and on the contrary knew nothing of the collection of texts in the Vatican. Mr. 
Bryce, in studying the texts, has overlooked the coins. Many of these still exist, and 
they are of a type so peculiar and in numbers so vast, as to defy the arts of forgers. 
They prove not only that the Greek empire was known to the medieval world, but that 
in many respects the former held control of the latter. 



204 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

and these condemnations repeated. The mutilators and forgers hav- 
ing had it all their own way for upwards of twelve centuries, their 
evil work cannot be undone in a day. 

In reconstructing the Medieval constitution it is intended to dis- 
pense so far as possible with the evidences which have emanated from 
or undergone the censorship of the Vatican. It is possible that some 
of these censored evidences are genuine, but the chances of this are 
so small, and the number of valid evidences in proportion to the im- 
mense arsenal of forged and mutilated ones, is so few and unimportant, 
that it is deemed far safer to rely upon materials less likely to de- 
ceive. The most important of these materials is the substance of the 
Sacred constitution and the course of its evolution as indicated by 
archaeology. 

Before proceeding with this task it is again deemed necessary to 
remind the reader of the difficulty which arises from the continual 
operation of feudalization. When this movement began, that is to say, 
when Julius Caesar founded the empire, the latter embraced the en- 
tire civilized world. When the movement ended, the empire consisted 
of a wax cheese, which Francis II., who surrendered it to Napoleon, 
affected to regard as the great seal of Rome. No matter at what epoch 
it be attempted to photograph such an empire, the image, on account 
of its continual recession, is sure to be indistinct. As if to increase 
the perplexity occasioned by this movement, the asra which began 
with the death of Charlemagne witnessed another. This latter move- 
ment was pontifical absorption. It was the attempt of a fief of the 
western empire to swallow the whole of it. The lord of this fief began 
by greasing and adoring the person of Charlemagne; he ended by 
thrusting his foot into the suppliant face of Henry IV. Such encroach- 
ments of pontifical power were incessant. Even after the pontificate 
had seized the entire sovereignty of the western empire, it wanted 
more. It demanded the little things as well as the great ones; it laid 
claim to everything in sight; and in all those parts of the western 
world which had accepted the yoke of the gospel, it seized upon and 
held possession of the most lucrative offices and functions. Not only 
did it grasp benefices, fiefs, lands, slaves and tithes; not only did it 
turn births, baptisms, marriages, churchings, deaths, burials and other 
institutions and incidents of social and sacramental life into sources 
of revenue ; it succeeded in filling all the municipal offices, from elder 
down to beadle; it obtained the contracts for public works, it held 
the fairs; it laid the sewers, swept the streets and undertook to re- 
move garbage, it did all this sometimes under the imperial constitu- 



CONSTITUTION OF THE MEDIEVAL EMPIRE. 205 

tion and sometimes in defiance of it ; it was munificently paid for these 
r.iunicipal works and yet it did them so badly, that the plague was a 
constant attendant of these dismal ages. 

As shown in a previous chapter, these functions had once been lavv- 
ful prerogatives of the ecclesiastical organization and it could not 
bring itself to abandon them. During the early empire and so long as 
the emperor and high-priest were legally and actually one person, the 
profits which the Church derived from these sources went to fill the 
coffers and augment the splendour and power of the Caesars. But when 
the emperor and high-priest became two different personages, there at 
once ensued a confusion arising out of these claims and powers, from 
which it is difficult to extract any order. Moreover, they often 
stretched across the lines of the feudal system; that is to say, while 
hierarchical mystery, sanctity, or pride, would have employed them 
vicariously, hierarchical avidity exercised them directly. To deter- 
mine whether or not the Church vestries exerted their functions 
constitutionally, would be a task of extreme difficulty and doubtful 
utility. " 

Bearing in mind these two movements, (namely, feudalization and 
the pontifical absorption of imperial powers, municipal offices and 
private property,) it is deemed useless to attempt to define the re- 
spective claims of the emperor and the pope and far safer to depict 
the constitution as a whole and irrespective of feudalization and papal 
encroachment. This view will extend from the period when the Sacred 
empire was split into halves by the joint efforts of Pepin and Stephen, 
to that of its practical extinction in 1204. It will be time enough af- 
terwards to indicate the degree of autonomy which Britain, Gaul and 
the other provinces of the West derived from the feudalizing opera- 
tion of hierarchical government. 

Worship of Cassar. — The contentions introduced by the "Christian " 
clergy concerning the nature of the Son of God — whom some argued 
was a myth, some a spirit, some a body, some that he had existed 
from eternity, some that he was first created in the reign of Tiberius, 
some that he was consubstantial with the Father, some that he was 

^ The citizens of those American cities whose municipal works and affairs have been 
practically subjected to the influence of ecclesiastical organizations, may derive some 
consolation from the extreme antiquity of the custom. This unwritten feature of cer- 
tain modern constitutions may be traced through the vestries of the middle ages back 
to the Sacred empire, the Commonwealth, and perhaps even to archaic Rome and 
Etruria. Directly or indirectly, lawfully or surreptitiously, the pontifex-maximus, 
whether pagan or Christian, has enjoyed the profits of tlie streets and sewers for up- 
wards of two thousand five hundred years. 



2o6 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

of the same substance, some that he was of like substance, some that 
he was of unlike substance, some that he was of no substance and so 
on through an endless variety of theories — these contentions enraged 
Constantine, wearied and divided his sons, (when they succeeded to 
the empire,) and prompted Julian to seek repose from them by officially 
restoring the worn-out religion of Sun-worship. His apostacy from 
"Christianity" seems to have been especially prompted by the strife 
which he believed the Christian clergy had stirred up between his 
cousins, Constantine, Constans, and Constantius, a curious testimony 
concerning which is supplied by Theodoret, in the dialogue between 
the latter and Liberius, a bishop of Rome, who came before the em- 
peror to plead for the recall of Athanasius. 

The Emperor Constantius : " What proportion of the world do you 
Christians constitute that you would break its peace in order to re- 
instate one solitary man" (meaning Athanasius)? 

Liberius : " O, Lord, it is a thing hitherto unheard of that a judge 
should accuse the absent of impiety, as though he were an enemy." 

The Emperor: "All men have been injured by him, but none so 
deeply as I. Not content with occasioning the death of my eldest 
brother, (Constantine II.,) he (Athanasius) endeavoured to excite 
Constans, of sacred memory, against me, and had not his aims been 
frustrated by my self-restraint, he would have succeeded in provok- 
ing a bloody contest between us."' 

Not only was the nature of the Son the cause of dispute, so was 
that of the Mother, and even that of the Holy Ghost. ^ Some con- 
tended that Mary was not the Mother of the Saviour; some that she 
remained a virgin after bearing James;* some that she continued to 
be a virgin after she married Cleopas or Alpheus; and so on, ad 
infinitum. One of the numerous contentions concerning the Holy 
Ghost is thus described by Sozomen: 

^ Although Constantine presided at the council of Nicaea, in Galatia, where the Cath- 
olic creed is said to have been formulated, his own views on the subject of religion 
appear to have been unsettled and variable. Among his inimediate successors, Con- 
stantine II., Constantius and Valens were Arians; Constans and Valentinian were 
Catholics; Julian, at first an Arian, afterwards became a pagan; while Gallus. his 
brother, whom Constantius had appointed as Caesar of the Asian provinces, was a 
Catholic; scat least claims Theodoret, ii, 15; in, i, 3. But as Constantine, Constan- 
tius, Julian and Gallus all died suddenly, it may not be safe to rely upon the state- 
ments of the ecclesiastical historian. 

** Macedonius, bishop of Constantinople, "began to teach that the Son is God and 
that he is in all respects and in substance like unto the Father. But he affirmed that 
the Holy Ghost was inferior in dignity and designated him a minister and a Servant." 
Sozomen, iv, 27. * Mark, vi, 3. 



CONSTITUTION OF THE MEDIEVAL EMPIRE. 207 

"A question was renewed at this juncture which had previously 
excited much inquiry, namely, whether the Holy Ghost is or is not 
to be considered consubstantial with the Father and Son. Length- 
ened disputes ensued on this subject, similar to those concerning 
the nature of God, the Word. Those who asserted that the Son is 
dissimilar from the Father, and those who insisted that he is 
similar in substance to the Father, came to one common opinion 
concerning the Holy Ghost, for both parties maintain that the Holy 
Ghost differs in substance from the other two persons of the Trinity 
and that he is but the minister and the third person of the Trinity in 
point of dignity and precedence. Those, on the contrary, who be- 
lieved that the Son is consubstantial with the Father, believed also 
that the Holy Ghost is consubstantial with the Father and the Son. 
This doctrine is jealously maintained in Syria by Appolinarius, 
Bishop of Laodicea, in Egypt by Athanasius the Bishop of Alex- 
andria, and in Cappadocia and in Pontus, by Basil and Gregory. The 
bishops of Rome on hearing that this dispute was conducted with 
great acrimony, and that the contention seemed daily to increase, 
wrote to the eastern churches urging them to accept the doctrine 
adopted by the western ones, namely — that the three persons of the 
Trinity are of the same substance and of equal dignity."* 

In refusing to confer the privilege of monopoly upon the doctrines, 
ceremonies and rites which constituted the Christianity of this period 
— in other words, in extending toleration to all other religions — 
Julian deferred to the wishes of classes who were still powerful.' 
While the intellectual portion of the Roman world were disgusted 
with emperor-worship and indifferent to astralism, the ignorant 
masses, unable to comprehend the explanations of the nascent and 
dissentient Christian church, shrank from its moral interpretations, 
and willingly clung to such familiar wrecks of the old pagan re- 

® Sozomen, Ecclesiastical History, vi, 22. 

'' The Jews, even during their hierarchy, were never divided into more than a few 
sects of religious belief, while the Greeks and Romans, like their predecessors, the 
Buddhists and Brahmins, were divided into several hundred. Hieun Tsing, a Chinese 
missionary, whose travels in India, A. D. 642, are translated by the Rev. Dr. Beal, 
says that in Mid India alone there were ninety-six heretical sects and that they were 
continually at variance. Beal, i, xlviii and 80. The Christian philospher, Themistius, 
pronounced an oration in his (the emperor Valens') presence, in which he took occa- 
sion to show that the diversity of opinion existing concerning ecclesiastical doctrines 
ought not to be regarded with surprise, insomuch as still greater diversity of opinion, 
leading to perpetual disputes and contentions, was prevalent among the Roman pagans. 
Sozomen, Ecclesiastical History, vi, 36. 



2o8 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

ligions as were permitted to float upon the turbulence of the period. 

"The inhabitants of Cysicus sent an embassy to the emperor, es- 
pecially to entreat the restoration of the pagan temples." This city 
was famous for its worship of Maia. Indeed, this and the related 
worship of Dion-Issus, or Bacchus, constituted the prevailing creed 
of the whole of Gallo-Graecia. The Jews of Syria had long rendered 
themselves detested by worshipping a deity whom they pretended 
was incorporeal, and could not be embodied in statues or painting. 
The Egyptians had an entire pantheon of painted divinities. The 
Goths and Saxons clung to Woden and Thor. The Gauls had their 
Hesus and Vulcan; whilst in the metropolitan cities of Constanti- 
nople, Alexandria and Rome, all these religions came together, and 
over the dead body of emperor-worship and an expiring astralism, 
clamoured and competed for the control of its vast possessions, its 
valuable privileges and its rich livings 

What would have been religious freedom in a republic, was religious 
anarchy in an empire, and heresy in an hierarchy. It was this anarchy 
or heresy that Julian sought to repress; but his conservatism was be- 
hind the age. Evolution never goes backward. The "Christian" 
populations of the metropolitan cities were now so considerable, so 
influential and so zealous, that the attempt to check the development 
of their religion only invoked their more active hostility. Christians 
had long occupied many of the temples of worship, they filled the 
municipal offices and had held many of the imperial ones. Both the 
commanders and soldiers of the legions recruited and stationed in 
Italy and the eastern provinces consisted largely of Christians, that 
is, if one may use this term to include all those who were so-called 
and who were opposed to emperor and Sun-worship. This simple and 
all-embracing sort of Christianity had even enjoyed a sporadic grow \h 
in distant Gaul, in whose metropolitan city of Treves the exiled Athan- 
asius had once found congenial asylum.* 

Had this expansion of the new religion encountered the hostility 
of a creed and measures similar to those which were afterwards pro- 
claimed by Mahomet, it is possible that Christianity might have been 
temporarily subverted in Italy and Greece, as afterwards it was in 
Egypt and Anatolia. But Julian attempted to associate Christianity ^ 
with a worn-out idolatry. He treated the votaries and preachers of 
Christianity with a degree of indulgence which the Christian writers 
themselves could only account for on the score of divine inter- 
position. With equal indulgence he permitted polytheism and idolatry. 

^ So.-^omen, v, 15, et passim. 



CONSTITUTION OF THE MEDIEVAL EMPIRE. 209 

He exhorted the people of Pescinus to pray to the Mother of God;" 
he patronized the Jews; he tolerated the rites of Woden; he encour- 
aged Sun-worship; he wrote a treatise to defend the Unity of the 
deity; and yet he demanded to be worshipped as a god himself. He 
ordered the crucifixes of the Nile to be removed from the Christian 
churches, and redeposited in the temple of Serapis, or Jupiter Am- 
mon; " he placed the pictures of the ancient gods in juxtaposition 
with his own; he demanded that homage should be paid to the pict- 
ures and images of himself; " and to crown this long list of indul- 
gences, contradictions and impieties, he caused a bronze group at 
Csesaria Philippa, which according to the ecclesiastical writers rep- 
resented Jesus and a woman, to be taken down, and a statue of himself 
to be erected upon its site and worshipped; thus restoring to this 
place the impious religion of the Caesars. '* But it was too late. 
The Roman world had endured four centuries of this degrading cult 
and had cast it out forever. Whether Julian was removed, as the pagans 
charge, by a Christian assassin, or as the Christians claimed, by the 
hand of Providence, is of no consequence in this connection. " Un- 
der no circumstances could Julian orany other emperor of this period 
have restored the played-out adoration of the Caesars. Before him, 
Constantine, and after him, Valentinian, and even Theodosius, co- 
quetted with this syren of Self- Worship; yet Theodosius became so 
convinced of the utter hopelessness of the Cause that, being a prac- 
tical politician, he turned quite round, and adopted such drastic 

' See his letter to Arsacius, the pagan bishop of Galatia, in Sozomen, v, 16. 

'" The crucifixes of the Nile were a series of wooden crosses erected at intervals along 
the river banks, the transverse beams of the crosses serving to mark the height of the 
normal inundation upon which the welfare and even safety of the country so vitally 
depended. When the water rose high enough to submerge the beam, all danger of 
famine was averted, and long before the tera of Christianity it was the custom of the 
grateful peasants, upon the subsidence of the flood, to deposit the crucifixes in their 
favorite temples. A similar custom relates to the river Ganges and to still more ancient 
times. This and the custom of building the most ancient Hindu temples in the form 
of a cross are described by Higgins, Taylor, Hislop and other authors. Both the 
crosses which were used to mark the floods of the Nile and another pagan custom of 
crosses, are mentioned in the " Octavius " of Minucius Felix, written about A. D. 270, 
(ed. Cantab., 1712, p. 800,) and by the Rev. Dr. Reeves in his "Apologies of the 
Fathers," i, 139. A crucifix of this sort held in the left hand of the goddess was found 
in the temple of Isis in Pompeii. Sir William Hamilton, p. 17. In fact, the use of the 
crucifix as a symbol of immortality is as old as Buddhism. 

"Sozomen, v, 17. '^ Sozomen, v, 21; Eusebius, vii, 18. 

'^ " Libanius clearly states that the emperor fell by the hand of a Christian; and this 
probably was the truth . . . All men concur in receiving the account which proves 
his death to have been the result of divine wrath." Sozomen, vi, 2. 



2IO THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

measures of repression against it, that it never permanently reared 
its head again in either Rome, Alexandria, or Constantinople. '* 

But the case was far different in the provinces. There emperor- 
worship lingered for more than two centuries longer. Many allusions 
to it are contained in the works of the Christian fathers of the fifth, 
sixth and seventh centuries. Islam with its thundering proclamations 
of an Incorporeal and Unital deity and its sweeping interdict of 
images, paintings and efifiigies, was a pointed protest against emperor- 
worship; not, as is commonly supposed, against Christianity. This is 
proved by the fact that the Koran preserves many of the Christian 
mysteries, " but not one of those which owes its origin to the hero and 
emperor-worship of the Greeks or Romans. Indeed, had there pre- 
viously existed no emperor-worship in the eastern provinces of Rome, 
the religion of Mahomet would probably have converted nobody ex- 
cept his wives. Yet even in the provinces and long before the advent 
of Mahomet, emperor-worship had disgusted the better class of citi- 
zens and these had fallen back for a religious belief upon astralism 
and the old anthropomorphic polytheism. The provincial altars of the 
fourth and fifth centuries were reared mainly to Mithra or to Jupiter, 
Mars, Maia, Bacchus, Neptune or the other divinities of polytheism; 
few were erected to the emperors; and none to Jesus Christ. '* 

The Infallibility of the sovereign-pontiff and his superiority to law 
had lost its former force, not merely because the emperor was no 
longer a god, nor the descendant nor successor of a god, but also be- 
cause the feudal system, which imposed services upon inferiors, also 
created obligations on the part of superiors. Under the constitutions 
of Julius and Augustus the emperor had every right, but no duties; 
and the feudal system of that early age, though it exhibited a rapid 
development in other respects, was as yet distant from the matured 
principle of suzerainty. The moment the emperors surrendered their 
pontifical character, and ceased to be infallible, the obligation to pro- 
tect their vassals (together with other obligations) came into play, 
and the union of this obligation with the already existing features of 
the Sacred constitution resulted in the medieval phase of feudalism. 
The cessation of imperial infallibility began with Tiberius, who, pro- 
testing himself a man, refused to be worshipped as a god; but it was 

'■* See ante, 

1^ The term " Christian mysteries" is frequently used by Sozomen and other early 
ecclesiastical writers. 

J« Even could the bronze group of Csesaria Philippa be verified. tKe exception would 
establish a rule. 



» CONSTITUTION OF THE MEDIEVAL EMPIRE. . 211 

not completely ended till Theodosius, clearl)' perceiving the inability 
of astralism to serve the state, proclaimed the divinity of the Lord 
Jesus Christ, and dealt a fatal blow both to the moribund and im- 
pious worship established by Julius Caesar and the Mithraism, Bac- 
chism and Manichseism which succeeded it. 

Under the original constitution of the Sacred empire the reigning 
Caesar was^god, emperor and high-priest, all in one; under the same 
constitution, as modified during the first and second centuries, he 
was high-priest and emperor in praesentia, and a god orsaint in futuro. 
Upon the adoption of Christianity by the state, the emperor lost his 
pontifical character but remained the suzerain and superior of the 
chief -pontiff, whose appointment and removal were subject to his con- 
trol. When the Latin See revolted from the empire, the Basileus 
lost half of his dominions, but his constitutional powers and attributes 
with regard to the East and some of those relating to the West, re- 
mained unchanged. In the west Charlemagne attempted to assume 
precisely the same attitude toward the See of Latium that the Basileus 
preserved toward that of Constantinople ; the bishop of Rome was his 
vassal, subject both to his appointment and removal. But, unlike the 
more tractable priesthood of the Oriental provinces, the sacerdotal 
classes of Gaul, Etruria and Latium had been so long accustomed to 
govern sovereigns, that they found it impossible to obey them, and 
even before the indomitable Charlemagne had passed away, the Latin 
See had made its preparations to overthrow his empire and rule 
in his place. After his death all ecclesiastical authority and preroga- 
tives in western Christendom, except such as had been reserved to 
the Basileus in the Treaty of Seltz, fell practically into the hands of 
the Latin See. To put it briefly, in the Eastern empire the Basileus 
rapidly regained control of such sacerdotal powers as Theodosius had 
surrendered to Siricius ; while in the Western empire the emperor con- 
tinually lost his advantage. 

Feudal system. We are not here concerned with the development 
of the feudal system under the Medieval constitution, further than to 
mark its synchronism with the growth of the hierarchical system. It 
attained the full extent of this development almost at the same time 
that the haughty claims of the Latin See reached their summit of 
impudence. Between the date when feudalism received its first blow 
and the hierarchy its first check, there elapsed less than half a cen- 
turv of time. In 1037 Conrad forbade the feudal lords of Lombardy 
to alienate the fief of a vassal without such vassal's consent; in 1080 
Henry degraded that same Gregory whose pardon he had begged and 



212 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

v/hose feet he had kissed, five years before. Gibbon has noticed that 
feudalism was strengthened by the papacy; '' what he omitted to re- 
cord in the same place is that it was also weakened by the papacy; in 
short, that feudalism was an hierarchical product which rose and fell 
with its source. So likewise Bryce has noticed that knighthood and 
priesthood were organized alike. " What this accomplished writer has 
omitted to notice is that they sprang from the same fountain and are 
now emptying into the same sea. 

The Sacred College and Pontifex Maximus. Though the Treaty of 
Seltz probably recognized or asserted its indivisibility, the Sacred 
College was now practically separated into two organizations, one at 
Constantinople, the other at Rome, the former presided over by the 
Basileus, the latter by the bishop, now commonly called the pope, of 
Rome; '* and both practically exercising the office of pontifex-maxi- 
mus within the domain of their respective churches. The rejection 
of the patriarch Photius by Pope Nicholas in 858 probably attests 
the destruction at that date of the Treaty of Seltz; while the excom- 
munication of the latter by the former in 867 marks the practical fact 
of separation. The two Sacred Colleges were similarly organized, and 
although they did not legally possess, they exercised, or controlled, 
similar powers, functions and relations. 

So long as the Roman hierarchy was governed by monarchs who 
united in themselves the dual functions of sovereign and high-priest, 
no religious disputes, no heresies, no dissonances of doctrine, were 
permitted to vex the public mind. Non-conformists were promptly 
seized, tried, condemned, and banished, or executed. The Sacred 
officers whose duty it was to discover and accuse all who doubted the 
infallibility of the Sacred emperor ^ere called inquisitores, and the 
tribunal which tried them, an inquisitione. " In 353 Constantius, 
"Christian " emperor of the East, interdicted all heretical rites, under 
the draconic penalty of death. In the following generation Theodo- 
sius, the "Christian" emperor of the West, appointed inquisitors to 
examine and punish the Manichaeans; and he applied to all non-con- 
formists the fell penalties of treason or crimen majestatis. One of 

" " Decline and Fall," v, 163 (chap, xlix), Mr. Bryce makes a similar observation. 
The erroneous notion that the papacy opposed feudalism is refuted elsewhere in the 
present work. '* " Holy Roman Empire," 251. 

'* The title pope, from the Greek word papa, signifying a father, was the common 
name of all bishops until Gregory VII., at a council held at Rome, in 1076, ordered 
the title to be restricted to the bishop of Rome. Townsend, Manual of Dates, p. 768. 

^°Cic. Verr., 11, 4; Pliny, viii, 40; Tacitus, Annals, xv, 66; Suetonius, Cass., i; 
Pliny, Ep., in, 9. 29. 



CONSTITUTION OF THE MEDIEVAL EMPIRE. 213 

the first fruits of this pious measure was the miraculous conversion 
of St. Augustine. In 398 Honorius issued a similar edict against the 
Montanists, Eunomians and other heretics, while the Code of Jus- 
tinian is replete with provisions which, because they subsequently re- 
appeared in the papal bulls of the thirteenth century, have induced 
some writers to place a comparatively modern date upon an institu- 
tion which was really founded by the divine Julius Caesar. 

After the emperors of Rome relinquished the high-priesthoqd they 
retained the right to appoint the high-priest, and this right was ex- 
ercised by every emperor of united Rome and afterwards by every 
emperor of the Eastern and Western empires, from Theodosius to 
Charlemagne inclusive. The right of the emperor to appoint the 
high-priest was never questioned until after the death of Charlemagne, 
the destruction of the Treaty of Seltz, and the appearance of the 
Forged Decretals. After that time, whilst the Eastern emperors con- 
tinued to appoint their own high-priest or patriarch, the Western 
pontifex-maximus was elected by the Sacred College, which had prac- 
tically become independent. Once elected, he commonly needed no 
further confirmation of his power. This, however, depended upon the 
varied fortunes of the Guelph and Ghibelline wars. 

Monachism, Canonization and Sanctuaries. The origin of these 
institutes in the hierarchy established by Julius and Augustus and 
their development during the period when Christianity supplanted the 
previous worships of Rome, have been sufficiently traced elsewhere in 
this work. Monks and conventual sanctuaries of pre-Christian date 
are frequently mentioned in the Buddhist records and by the early 
ecclesiastical writers. Sozomen gives a long account of those which 
flourished during and after the reign of Constantine. The emperor 
Theodosius refused to give battle without consulting a soothsayer, 
the holy monk of Lycopolis. Many of the monks were outlaws and 
refugees from justice, who fled to the Desert, to escape the punish- 
ment of their crimes, Sozomen says that Macarius, the Younger, the 
priest of Cellia, who dwelt in the desert of Scetis, had been a shep- 
herd near Lake Mareotis, where a " murder which he (unintention- 
ally) committed, was the original cause of his embracing a life of 
philosophy." Eulogius, the presbyter, who had charge of the place, 
made it a rule to exclude from the altar those who had committed 
crimes. But though excluded from officiating at the altar, it is not 
related that any such person, when prepared to pay for his accom- 
modation, was driven out of the monastery. On the contrary, we are 
assured that shelter was given to Moses, a fugitive slave, who after 



214 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

becoming the leader of a band of thieves " embraced a life of asceti- 
cism and attained the highest point of philosophical perfection. " This 
is proved by his being chosen presbyter over the monks of Scetis. 
Evagrius, a scapegrace, who, during the reign of Theodosius, held 
an archdeaconship at Constantinople, and was banished^that city for 
committing a crime, fled to the same convenient sanctuary and was 
admitted. " 

It is to persons of this description, those whose monastic penances 
formed their atonement for crime, that have sometimes been attrib- 
uted the destruction of historical documents, the forgeries of other 
writings and the endless ecclesiastical frauds and impostures which 
have been detected in the polluted stream of medieval history. But 
as such persons never could have formed the majority of any large 
community and as the work of destruction and perversion included the 
demolition of temples, the defacement of statues, the forgery of coins, 
the fabrication of false relics, and the invention of miracles, we must 
suppose many of these offences to have been committed by otherwise 
perfectly virtuous men. These persons probably believed that they 
knew all about those eternal mysteries, the origin of Matter and the 
nature of God, and deemed themselves justified in destroying, cor- 
rupting, or defacing everything that did notagreewith their conceited 
conclusions on these subjects. Modern Christianity, influenced by the 
civil law, often punishes this class of zealots with the straight-jacket 
and the reformatory ; whilst miracles, under similar discouragement, 
have almost totally disappeared; but no one can read Eusebius, 
Socrates, Theodoret, or Sozomen, without being convinced that there 
was a time when the so-called Christian world regarded those who 
committed such impostures, even to the Stylites, Grasseaters, and 
Worm-breeders, with both respect and veneration. 

If modern philosophy permits us to entertain with complacency the 
theory that men and monkeys descend from common ancestors, and 
these from still lower animals, surely it need awaken no honest in- 
dignation to be told that man's now dominant religion once tolerated 
such impostures and impostors. The theory of Evolution may humil- 
iate us with the mortifying conviction of a lowly and obscure origin; 
on the other hand, it cannot fail to gratify us with the consciousness 
of the nobler characteristics which have been already acquired and 
the yet nobler ones which are within reach of our race. 

The progress of monachism during the medieval ages is too familiar 
a subject to need any further enlargement in this work. As an instil 

"' Sozomen, vi,' 28, 30. 




CONSTITUTION OF THE MEDIEVAL EMPIRE. 2v5 

tution of law it rose and fell with the hierarchy; as one of religion 
it has long since cast off its rough envelope and ascended to that 
higher plane upon which all religions and religious orders and ob- 
servances have stood since the Reformation. The period when 
monasteries were first employed as tombs for royal heirs or kings, 
whom it was desirable to suppress or sweep away, but impolitic to 
assassinate, is not readily determined. No evidence of the practice 
appears previous to the secession of Rome from the Eastern empire 
in the seventh century. After the period of confusion which suc- 
ceeded the death of Charlemagne, the destruction of the Frankish 
and the erection of the Medieval empire, it gave way to the more 
certain agency of private wars. A list of some of the royal victims 
interned in monasteries during the medieval age appears in an Ap- ; 
pendix (E). 

Sacred Writings. Mention has already been made of the Sibylline 
gospels, the several revisions they underwent during the early em- 
pire, and the frequent and reverential mention of them which was 
made by the Christian fathers. Eusebius, who is assigned to the 
fourth, and Sozomen, to the fifth century, seem to be the latest of 
the ecclesiastic writers who deferred to the authority of these gos- 
pels; but the tone, though still respectful, is no longer reverential.^'^ 
If they echo the views of the period, it indicates that these gospels 
had lost caste. Their decline as inspired works probably dates from 
the reign of Constantine. Substitutes for the Sibylline gospels were 
found in the writings of Virgil, in the spurious charter of St. Peter, 
and in the numerous other pretended communications from heaven 
which were employed in the interest of church or state during the 
dark and medieval ages. Many of these impostures served their pur- 
pose so long and so effectually that they deserve collectively to be 
included in the fundamental laws of the empire. 

Succession to the Throne. As we are now describing a double- 
headed empire which at times was governed by an emperor, at others 
by a pope, and at still other times by both, this article should prop- 
erly mention the manner of choosing both of these magistrates. 
But as the manner of the papal succession is well known, it is only 
necessary to allude to that of the emperor. The original rule of 
succession was by sacerdotal choice, as when the high-priest Julius 
appointed Octavius (Augustus) to succeed the emperor Julius. 

-^ Eusebius, Life of Constantine; and Sozomen, Ecc. History, i, i, and n, i. The 
work of Sozomen is but a fragment; and even this is commonly admitted to have been 
much altered and mutilated. 



2l6 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

After Nero, the last of the Julian line, the succession seems to have 
practically fallen to the choice of the proconsuls. With the ever- 
increasing isolation of the provinces, it subsequently fell to the 
praetorian guards. Upon the disbandment of these functionaries, the 
sacerdotal principle reasserted itself and was observed by the Sacred 
emperors — not, however, without exception — down to the close of 
the Eastern empire. That they commonly appointed their own sons 
to succeed them does not bespeak an abandonment of the principle. 
In the West an entirely different state of affairs existed, and a dif- 
ferent rule prevailed. Here (unlike the East) the imperial and sacer- 
dotal offices were invested in different persons, who dwelt far apart, 
the one residing, say, at Aix-la-Chapelle, the other at Rome; the 
former as supreme suzerain, the latter as vassal. So long as the high 
priesthood remained in this dependent position, as it did during the 
Carlovingian and substantially during the Saxon dynasties, the im- 
perial rule of succession seems to have been hereditary.*' Such was 
also the case during the subsequent dynasties, down to the period 
of the Guelph and Ghibelline contest, when, during a temporary 
ascendency of the pontificate over the imperial office, the imperial 
succession was regulated by an apparently provincial but really 
ecclesiastical College of Electors, organized and controlled at Rome. 
In this college, Germany, Gaul, (including Burgundy and Britain,) 
and Italy were represented by prelates; whilst Bohemia, Saxony, 
Brandenburg and the Palatinate voted by their respective rulers." 
These were a king, a duke, a count and a marquis, thus apparently 
representing the four orders of nobility, but in reality representing 
none of them. The artificiality of this arrangement of itself betrays 
the ecclesiastical organization and control of the college. However, 
this is shown by other evidences. 

Dr. Robertson," after branding as a forgery the supposed edict 
of Otto III., which pretended to vest the right of choosing the em- 
peror in the Seven Electors, and after showing that the earliest 
genuine allusion to them occurs in Martinus Polonus, tempo Frederick 
II., falls into a trap cunningly prepared by Onuphrius Panvinius, an 
Augustine monk of Verona, of the sixteenth century. Onuphrius 

^^We say "seems to have been," because for all that is known to the contrary, the 
succession to the Western imperial throne may have been subject under the Treaty of 
Seltz to the nomination or approval of the Basileus. 

** Robertson says that " the three archbishops were chancellors of the three great 
districts into which the empire was anciently divided." These chancellorships embraced 
the entire Western empire. There was no Lord Chancellor of England until after the 
fall of the Basileus. " " Charles V.," Note XLii. 



CONSTITUTION OF THE MEDIEVAL EMPIRE. 217 

taught that the imperial right of succession was determined by prse- 
taxation. He pretended that this was an ancient German mode of 
election, in which the chieftains voted first and the people after- 
wards, either to confirm or reject. Omitting the last part of this 
ceremony, we have the mode of succession adopted by the Seven 
Electors, which Dr. Robertson was thus led to believe had been 
derived from the barbarians. Unfortunately for the credit of his in- 
genious theory, Onuphrius did not explain why the Germans for 
centuries had forgotten all about prastaxation until the Basileus of 
the East was overthrown, nor how they succeeded in suddenly in- 
ducing all the nations of Christendom to accept it. Nor did he 
explain why the praetaxation of the Seven Electors so fatally (for 
the truth of his pretension) resembled the Roman proconsular mode 
of electing the emperor; nor did he adduce those provisions of the 
lost Treaty of Seltz, which probably covered the subject, and if so 
would have furnished the best evidence concerning the disputed 
rule of succession. The presence of crowds of people at the corona- 
tion, who shouted approval of the election, a point strongly urged 
by Dr. Robertson, proves nothing. The sixty thousand mercenaries 
who "boomed" Lothaire II. no more cast the vote of the Roman 
"people " than the claque whom Charlemagne hired at St. Peter's, 
or the subsidized rabble that Julius Ccesar employed at the Luper- 
cal. Indeed there was no Roman "people" at any of these dates. 
Caesar had crushed them to pieces, converted the commonwealth 
into an hierarchy and sent it adrift, pointing to feudalism and ruin. 
When, to quote Dr. Robertson's phrase, Lothaire's " nomination 
was approved by the people," there was no " people" at all; only a 
nation of slaves. The ascription of the elective principle in the 
Medieval constitution to the aborigines of Germany, is as far-fetched 
as it would be to trace the mode of electing the American President 
to some obscure custom of the Choctaws. Between the Choctaws 
and the President there intervened many centuries of Anglo-Saxon 
civilization and liberty; between the Germania of Tacitus and the 
Seven Electors stood a millennium of Roman history. 

Infallibility; Crimen Ma jestatis; Inquisition; Excommunication. 
The hierarchical origin of these institutes and their rise and fall and 
revival under the various constitutions of Rome down to the dark 
ages, have been briefly treated in a previous chapter. Their reten- 
tion in the Medieval constitution affords additional proofs, were any 
wanting, of the identity of that government with the empire erected 
by Julius Caesar. 



2l8 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

Right of Assemblage. This right of the Roman citizen, which 
perished with the rise of the empire, revived when it fell. It is the 
right which, more than any other, distinguishes a free people from 
a nation of slaves. Its revival constitutes one of the most significant 
steps in the march of free institutions. 

Legislature; Juridical System; Education. The legislative and ju- 
ridical system of Rome has also been sufficiently sketched. With the 
establishment of the hierarchy all the institutes of freedom began to 
perish, and in the course of a few centuries they became extinct. The 
Comitia and the jury system were among the first to succumb. Be- 
tween the reigns of Tiberius and Diocletian the senate almost con- 
tinually declined, and with the establishment of the Christian code 
of Justinian, it went out of existence altogether. Speaking broadly, 
there was in the Medieval empire no such thing as legislation. The 
decrees of the Sacred College constituted the law, and this it en- 
trusted for execution to its own vast army of priests, monks and 
clerks. Within the limits of this jurisdiction a certain degree of license 
was permitted to the kings, dukes and counts of the various fiefs into 
which western Christendom was split, and under this license these 
princes had each his own petty court, courtiers, paladins and privy 
council, and, like Sancho Panza in his island, filled out their brief 
hour with a play of legislation and justice, until the resistless power 
that permitted these mockeries, chose to stop them and let fall the 
curtain. The " properties " of the feudal councils and courts of jus- 
tice were the canon-law, its gloomy inquisitors and compurgators, the 
burning ploughshare, the stigmata, the sweating image, and the other 
sacred relics, some of which, so long-lived are ignorance and idolatry, 
survive to the present day and defy the civil law against imposture. 
As for education, it followed the same downward course. One by one 
all the stars of ancient knowledge were blotted out by forgery and 
fraud. From the eighth to the thirteenth century those Christian stu- 
dents, whose yearning for truth would not rest satisfied with the pe- 
rusal of monkish fables, went to the Moslem university of Cordova, 
there to eagerly drink in some furtive draught of ancient learning. 
There was no such thing as a Christian university until the reign of 
Frederick II. Those of an earlier date were merely ecclesiastical 
schools. ^^ 

s Censorial and Consular Powers. The ancient consular office was 
abolished by Justinian, but the censorial office, though feudalized, 

^^ Such was Mr. Gladstone's recent utterance on the subject; but he cautiously kept 
out of view the reason why there were no universities before that time. 



CONSTITUTION OF THE MEDIEVAL EMPIRE. 



219 



Still remained. This included the power to conscript citizens formili- 
tary service, to assess property for taxation, to construct and repair 
public works, and to guard public morals, by crushing literature, art 
and the drama. These last functions had been appropriated by the, 
church, while the former had been resigned, with certain important 
limitations, to the provincial commanders, whether dukes, counts, or 
kings. " 

Robertson justly claims to have produced the clearest proofs that 
the barbarian leaders "had the command of soldiers or companions 
who followed their standard from choice, not by constraint."*^ In 
other words, he argues, that the barbarians' laws conferred no power 
upon the barbarian kings to compel military service. We must, there- 
fore, conclude that when such kings did enforce military service they 
did not exercise their prerogative as barbarian kings, for it is ex- 
pressly affirmed that they possessed no such prerogative, but that they 
exercised the censorial prerogative of Roman proconsuls, which dig- 
nity, it will be found, they always held, as in the instances of Clovis, 
Pepin and Charlemagne. It never seems to have occurred to the his- 
torian that if the barbarian kings had no power, derived from their 
own institutes, to enforce military service, they therefore had none 
to impose a feudal tenure upon lands, and that consequently this 
system must have arisen from some other source than the barbarian 
laws and customs. Such conclusion must inevitably force itself upon 
the mind. But of this subject, enough has been said already. Re- 
turning to the consideration of the powers exercised by certain bar- 
barian princes and as to whether they were barbarian or Roman powers, 
Dr. Robertson will be detained for a moment to give testimony as to 
some other matters in this connection. He says that " ecclesiastics 
never submitted, during any period of the middle ages, to the laws 
contained in the codes of the barbarian nations, but were governed 
entirely by the Roman law. . . . When any person entered into holy 
orders it was usual for him to renounce the code of laws to which he 
had been formerly subject and to declare that he now submitted to 
the Roman law. " He gives several instances of such renunciation 

^'' Sozomen, vi, 37, says that the emperor Valens "accepted gold from the cities and 
villages under his dominion instead of the usual complement of men for the military 
service," but he does not say that such commutation was usual, nor that it was levied 
by the imperial rather than the provincial authorities. It was probably nothing more 
than the exaction and remission to the emperor of the penalties for neglect to perform 
military service to the province. Some examples relating to this practice by Clovis and 
other provincial kings appear elsewhere in the present work. 

^^ Robertson, Notes vi and xxxviii. 



220 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

and adoption, together with the exact words employed in the cere- 
mony. ^^ 

We are now prepared to consider the acts of Clovis and Charle- 
magne. In the last year of his reign, 511, Clovis presided at the coun- 
cil of Orleans, where he forbade the bishops to admit any freedmen 
to ecclesiastical functions, because he might need their military ser- 
vice. '" If, as Dr. Robertson testifies, " ecclesiastics never submitted 
during any period of the middle ages to the laws contained in the 
code of the barbarian nations, but were governed entirely by the Ro- 
man law," it follows that Clovis, in this ordinance, which was pro- 
mulgated in and adopted by a council consisting of churchmen, 
exercised not a barbarian, but a Roman, prerogative; in short, a 
prerogative of the censorial office. In 807 Charlemagne ordered that 
every freedman who possessed five mansi (aboutsixty acres) of land, 
should be liable to military service. Another capitulary of the same 
prince forbade freedmen from undertaking ecclesiastical functions. 
"For we are informed" (says Charlemagne) "that this is practiced, 
not so much out of devotion, as to escape military service." Infrac- 
tion of this ordinance was punishable by a fine "according to the law 
of the Franks." This expression has led M. Guizot to suppose that 
there was an aboriginal Frankish law which compelled military ser- 
vice; whereas Dr. Robertson has clearly shown that no such law could 
have existed. Charlemagne probably referred to the ordinance of 
511, or to some further ordinance passed in pursuance of that one. 
As already seen, this ordinance was simply an exercise of the Roman 
censorial prerogative. 

In a field or camp a military commander may make the law ; in cities 
or councils public necessity demands that he shall obey it. There is 
no warrant for supposing that in this matter Charlemagne did not 
obey the law or pursue legal methods in seeking to change or modify 
it. In assuming the imperial diadem and undertaking the government 
of the Western world, he was doubly bound to obey the Roman law; 
first, because whatever strength he derived from the rehabilitation of 
the Western empire would have been lost had he begun by ignoring 
or violating its laws, and second, because those laws were already in 
force, as well in the Frankish dominions as elsewhere, throughout the 
West. Among them was the censorial prerogative, which from the 
ancient emperors of Rome had descended vicariously to their Frank- 
ish and other barbarian vassals, whose combined rights Pepin had 
conquered with the sword and Charlemagne was now endeavouring, 
^^ Robertson, Note xxiv. ^** Guizot, 11, 32. 



CONSTITUTION OF THE MEDIEVAL EMPIRE. 221 

though in vain, to place beyond the reach of the church. We shall 
yet see both the assessment and enlistment prerogatives of the Cen- 
sor grasped by the pontificate. We shall also see the latter, when its 
hands were full of power and riches, compelled, through its own ex- 
cessive greed, to drop them all. 

Revenue and Expenditure. When the Medieval empire was founded, 
the process of feudalization had already developed so far that the 
general revenues received into the JErarium had become inconsider- 
able. Those derived from regal ian rights, such as the coinage of 
silver, the mines, the profits of Jewry, customs and tolls, still re- 
mained; but as the feudalizing process continued they, too, were 
gradually wrested from the empire or granted or sold by the emperors 
to the powerful feudatories generated by the hierarchical nature of 
their own government. Says Mr. Bryce, "even the advowsons of 
churches had been sold or mortgaged and the imperial treasury de- 
pended mainly on an inglorious traffic in honours and exemptions. " " 
Things were so bad under Rudolph that the Electors refused to make 
his son Albert a king of the Romans, declaring that while Rudolph 
lived, the public revenue, which with difficulty supported one monarch, 
could much less maintain two. Sigismund informed the Diet that he, 
who had been chosen from among all the princes of Germany, would 
submit to no impairment of his sovereignty or restriction of his powers ; 
for as he had no means to depend upon beside his patrimony, his 
condition would be reduced to that of a lackey, rather than an em- 
peror.'^ Patritius, secretary of Frederick III., declared that the 
revenues of the empire in his time scarcely covered the expense of its 
ambassadors. Mr. Bryce adds the following note, by way of explana- 
tion: "At Rupert's death, under whom the mischief had increased 
greatly, there were, we are told, many bishops better off than the 
emperor."^' The same thing may have been said of many secular 
lords. This result was due, not so much to ecclesiastical rapacity, as 
to the feudalizing process, which is the result of ecclesiastic govern- 
ment. Our author regards the crown lands as the chief source of the 
imperial revenues; but as these were the patrimony of the emperors 
and descended not to their official successors but to their personal 
heirs, whether the latter were elevated to the imperial throne or not, 

^' These advowsons were the patronage of ecclesiastical benefices and livings claimed 
by or reserved to the emperor. 

^^ " Nihil esse imperio spoliatus nihil egentius odio ut qui sibi ex Germanise prin- 
cibus seccessurus esset qui prater patrimonium nihil aluid habuent apud eum non im- 
perium sed potius servitium sit futurum." '' ^^ Dr. Henry makes a similar remark. 



222 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

they have not been included in the present summary of revenues. 

The bulk of the revenues consisted of the rents of farms, the tal- 
liages of boroughs, benevolences, oblata, aids, indicta, customs, con- 
suetudo, tolls, and numerous smaller fines and profits, such as escheats, 
reliefs, wardships, princely marriages, knights' fees, etc., of which 
Madox has furnished the clearest accounts, and Stevens and Sinclair 
the most comprehensive histories. These revenues were collected 
mainly by the feudal nobility; and to such a length did their exac- 
tions proceed that, in 1391, the Count of Utrecht demanded a tax 
from the owners of windmills, on the ground that he was lord of the 
winds. This demand was disputed by the Bishop of Utrecht on the basis 
that Jesus Christ was lord of the winds, and that therefore the tax 
belonged to the church. We are not informed how the unseemly con- 
test ended. In 1394 the city of Haarlem paid windmill taxes to Al- 
bert, count palatine.'* 

We have seen no comprehensive account of the fisc under Pepin, 
Charlemagne and their immediate successors; but it is evident from 
the concern which these monarchs evinced upon the subject that they 
were anxious to bring the system under more thorough imperial con- 
trol. Some time between the reigns of Vespasian and Constantine and 
also during a period subsequent.to Constantine the ecclesiastical tithes 
collected in each diocese were divided into four parts and devoted 
equally to the bishops, the inferior clergy, the poor, and public wor- 
ship. ^^ During the last half of the fifth century this equitable arrange- 
ment appears to have been abrogated through the influence of the 
church, for it is not mentioned by either Ambrose or Chrysostom. 
However, it seems to have been revived by Justinian '* and again ab- 
rogated when the sceptre of the empire fell into weaker hands. One 
of the institutes of Charlemagne provides for the restoration of this 
arrangement, and, so long as he lived, the church appears to have sub- 
mitted to his decree; but no sooner was he laid in his gorgeous tomb 
than it boldly swept the tithes into its own coffers and expended them 
as it deemed proper. Historians are never tired of explaining that the 
institutes of Charlemagne failed because he divided his empire into 
three; it would be nearer the truth to attribute their failure to the 

'* Petty, Political Arithmetic, 172; Yeats, History Com., ed. 1872, p. 115; Beckmann, 
Hist. Invent., 1, 169; Guizot, Hist. Civ., in, 392, on the rights of the bishops of 
Beauvais, 

^* See the emperor Julian's charitable division of the revenues of Galatia, in his let- 
ter to Arsacius, high-priest of that province. Sozomen, v, 16. 

^^ Gibbon, chapter xx, and Thomassin, Disclipline de I'Eglise, tom. in. 



CONSTITUTION OF THE MEDIEVAL EMPIRE. 223 

political blunder which led him to divide the tithes into four. Charle- 
magne's sagacity did not mislead him when he built his institutes 
upon the antiquity and influence of the Roman Caesar; it failed him 
in not perceiving the still higher antiquity and greater power of the 
Roman Pontifex-Maximus. 

The most important of the imperial revenues which, from the time 
of the Cjesars, had belonged to the sacred fisc, were, after Charle- 
magne's death, collected by the provincial priests, under the names, 
I, of Rome-scat or Peters-pence, and II, tithes; the former, in money, 
for the papal treasury, the latter, partly in kind, to the holders of 
ecclesiastical livings, many of which had been purchased by the in- 
cumbents and paid for in Rome." The rapacity of the pagan clergy, 
which in ancient times had hastened the revolt of Boadicea against 
the authority of Rome, was doubtless followed by much milder meas- 
ures when those ecclesiastics had to deal with Roman colonists, in- 
stead of the aboriginal inhabitants of the provinces. But within a 
century after the Roman church became christianized in Britain and 
the other provinces, this rapacity, judging from the wealth of the 
bishops and clergy and the number and importance of the ecclesias- 
tical establishments, must have been renewed. 

We are assured that, by the edict of Milan, A. D. 313, the blessed 
Constantine, who in that year became emperor of Britain, Gaul and 
Italy,^* restored to the Christian church those considerable possessions 
and revenues of the pagan church within its dominions, of which it 
had been unjustly deprived by the impious Diocletian. This is a tissue 
of fabrication. Diocletian did not deprive the Christian church of its 

^^ The Peter's-pence of Wessex were collected by the agents of the papal treasury 
before Charlemagne's time. It does not appear what disposal was made of them during 
his reign. After his death they certainly went again to Rome. 

^'* A few dates here will assist the memory. In 308 the Roman empire was divided 
between six emperors as follows: Maximin Hercules, former coadjutor of Diocletian 
and father-in-law of Constantine I., governed the West. He was put to death by Con- 
stantine at Marseilles in 310. Maxentius, son of Maximin Hercules, governed Italy 
and Africa; he died 312. Constantine I., son-in-law of Maximin Hercules, governed 
Gaul and Britain. In 313 Constantine got Italy and Africa and became an Augustus. 
He afterwards obtained the whole empire, and died in 337. In the East, Galerius, 
(Caius Galerius Maximinianus,) son-in-law of Diocletian, governed Pannonia; he died 
at Sardica in 311. Maximinus (C. Galerius Valerius) governed Egypt and Syria as an 
Augustus; he died by poison at Taurus, or Tarsus, in 313. Licinius, brother-in-law 
and coadjutor of Constantine I., governed the Thracian bosphorus as an Augustus. 
In 314 he was defeated by Constantine, who now occupied Pannonia, Dacia, Dalma- 
tia, Macedon and Greece. A truce ensued between them for eight years. In 324 Con- 
stantine broke the truce, defeated Licinius, made friends with him, pardoned, and then 
strangled him. 



2 24 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

possessions or revenues, for at that time it had none, nor did Constan- 
tine restore them, for he had neither the authority nor the desire to 
enrich the Christians in such a manner. The property of the pagan 
church was consecrated to the gods. At the period of this decree, 
which was issued conjointly by himself and Licinius, Constantine had 
but recently conquered Italy; the decree itself shows that he was ig- 
norant of the Christian religion, and as a matter of fact he practised 
the pagan rites, and so did Licinius. The emperors simply proclaimed 
toleration toward all their subjects and restored the estates of those 
citizens who had been banished for political reasons by Maxentius. 
The mutilated Code of Theodosius '° contains a provision by which it 
is made to appear th'kt in 321 Constantine, emperor at that time of 
all the western provinces, granted permission to those, so willed, to 
make testamentary gifts to the Christians. This provision, itself an 
interpolation and a forgery, falsified to a certain extent the previous 
fabrication, because the Christians, until they obtained lawful control 
of the church, derived their communal wealth chiefly from testament- 
ary bequests, it follows that before this permission was accorded they 
could not have enjoyed any considerable possessions or revenues. 

We are further assured that after he had pursued to death and mur- 
dered his various rivals and relatives, the blessed Constantine ex- 
tended these edicts to other portions of the empire, with the view to 
purchase for his crimes a forgiveness which his less indulgent con- 
science refused to grant."" Whatever may be the truth with regard to 
these matters, is not at the present time of much consequence. As a 
matter of fact it was Theodosius and the senate who, in 394, endowed 
the Christian clergy with the possessions and revenues of the church, 
and there is no reason to believe that they were suffered to diminish 
during any portion of the millenium which followed this endowment. 
In the thirteenth century we find the pages of the monk Matthew 
Paris replete with complaints that the bulk of all the revenues col- 
lected in England went to Rome, not to be expended for any purpose 
connected with the welfare or interests of England, but to be lavished 
by the papal court in the indulgence of Roman pomp and luxury, 

^* Code XVI, ii, 4. 

^^ There is a rent-roll from the Vatican purporting to be of the fourth century, of 
the three Roman basilicas of St. Peter, St. Paul, and St. John Lateran, showing the 
annual revenues from houses, shops, gardens and farms in Italy, Africa and the East. 
This amounted to 22,000 besants of gold, besides a reserved rent in produce. In com- 
mon with " every record that comes from the Vatican," Gibbon suspects this document 
of being a forgery. The forgery probably consists only in the date, which has been 
altered to the extent of perhaps two or three centuries. 



CONSTITUTION OF THE MEDIEVAL EMPIRE. 225 

No evidence seems to have survived relating to any tribute or con- 
cession which, under the Treaty of Seltz, may have been paid by the 
Western empire as an acknowledgement of the suzerainty of the 
Basileus. Of course it will be denied by the apologists of the Forged 
Decretals that any such suzerainty existed; but although those who 
have forged or profited by the use of the Forged Decretals, knowing 
them to be forged, carefully mutilated or destroyed every bit of writ- 
ing which threatened to expose their Colossal Crime, they could not 
destroy everything. The earth has yielded to modern archaeological 
research monuments which indicate almost unerringly that such con- 
cessions were made and consequently that such suzerainty was ac- 
knowledged. 

Treasure Trove. After the barbarian revolts, the prerogative of 
Treasure Trove ceased to be exercised by the emperors of Rome. It 
fell to the provincial dukes and kings who succeeded them, and after- 
wards to the other feudal lords in whose hands it remained until the 
thirteenth century. 

Mines, Coinage and Legal-Tender. Both the Basileus, the Western 
emperor, and the proconsuls, or feudal kings, worked mines during 
this period. The gold coinage was entirely monopolized by the Bas- 
ileus; the silver coinage was exercised by the provincial kings, and 
often by the lords, both lay and ecclesiastical, who were subject to 
them. The prerogative of the copper coinage is a subject still shrouded 
in uncertainty. The ratio of value between silver and gold was uni- 
formly maintained by the Basileus at 12 for i. This he was enabled 
to do, first, through his monopoly of the gold coinage, and second, 
by the unvarying practice of the Sacred fisc to receive bullion of both 
metals at that ratio, not for private or " free " coinage, because there 
was none, but in payment of tributes, taxes and other dues. Under 
these regulations nobody could purchase a besant for less than twelve 
times its weight in silver of like fineness or standard. On the other 
hand, as at 12 for i the Basileus sold his Indian gold at nearly double 
its cost, "' he never failed to keep the provinces fully supplied with 

*' The number of pounds of silver required to purchase one pound of gold in the 
Orient was as follows in the places and at the dates named: Delhi, India, twelfth cen- 
tury, 8; 1340, 7; 1388, 6}4; 1556, 94-10; Japan, 1588, 84-10; 1854, 7X; i860, 6; 
China, fifth century B.C., 5to6; Chinese seaports, A. D. 1264, 1285 and 1294,10; 1290, 
Province of Karain, 8; 1290, city of Yunnan, in Kardandan, 5; 1340, (place not men- 
tioned,) '/, 1375. (doubtful and place not mentioned,) 4; 1556, seaports, 9; 1690, sea- 
ports, 10. The authorities for these quotations will be found in my various works on 
Money. Generally speaking, the ratio of silver to gold in the Orient, from the estab- 
lishment of the Roman empire by Julius Csesar to its fall in the thirteenth century, 



226 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

besants in exchange for silver. Under these regulations and practices 
it was impossible for the ratio to move. Consequently, from the time 
when Cresar sold his unrefined Gaulish gold in Italy for one-fourth 
less than the mint ratio, '^'^ until a short time previous to the Fall of 
Constantinople, there does not appear in the history of the Roman 
empire any example of a divergence of the legal and " market" or 
rather the " mint-and-mint " ratios of value between gold and silver. 
The first instances of such divergence appear in England during the 
reign of Stephen, Henry II., and John, when the legal ratio, as shown 
by the valuation of the gold besant in silver coins, differed from the 
' ' mint-and-mint " ratio, as shown by the payment into the exchequer 
of one sort of uncoined or " uncurrent " metal, for the other; a fact 
due to the introduction of Moslem coins from Spain. 

With regard to legal-tender, two principles regulated the practice 
of the medieval ages. These were: First, The only unlimited and uni- 
versal legal-tenders recognized throughout Christendom were the 
sacred besants of the Basileus. Second, All debts, provincial, corpo- 
rative, or individual, were payable in whatever money was legal-tender 
at the time and place of payment. This principle, a corollary of the 
axiom preserved by Paulus — that that is money which the state 
chooses to make money — will be found amply illustrated in the cele- 
brated Mixt Moneys case adjudicated in 1604 and the numerous au- 
thorities therein adduced. 

Lands, Testaments and Conveyances. Nothing need be added to 
what has already been said on these subjects, except that as a class 
the Roman land-surveyors, or agrimensores, gradually lost their oc- 
cupation, as the pontificate absorbed the lands. By the twelfth cen- 
tury the agrimensores wholly disappeared. An abstract of their an- 
cient body of laws and precepts, made in Rome some time during the 
sixth or seventh century, though more or less mutilated, is still ex- 
tant. It is referred to in some texts of the tenth and eleventh centuries. 
Nobility and Caste. Little need be added to what has already been 
said on this subject. Born of hierarchical government and the feudal 
system, the institution of caste rose and fell with them. In the de- 
struction of the hierarchy the breaking up of the "Holy Roman 
Empire " and the extinction of feuds, it lost its significance. To-day 

varied from 5 to 7 for i. By coining the gold, which he did, at the valuation of i 
weight for 12 weights of silver coins of equal fineness, and by retaining the monopoly 
of such gold coinage in his own hands, the Basileus earnt cent per cent profit on every 
purchase of gold for silver,or sale of silver for gold, made on his behalf in the Orient. 
*^ Suetonius, Julius Caesar, 54. 



CONSTITUTION OF THE MEDIEVAL EI.IPIKE. 227 

it is reduced to the merest stumps of a once luxuriant growth, shorn 
alike of its ancient power, privileges and lands. Although to the sov- 
ereign-pontiff alone belonged the right to create dukes, persons as- 
suming this title arose in many parts of France and England during 
the eleventh and twelfth centuries. French dukes of the eleventh 
century are mentioned by the labourious Brady. For England, we 
hear of Godwin, duke of Wessex ; Leofric and Elf ere, dukes of >Mercia ; 
Tosti and Morca, dukes of Northumberland, and Harold, duke of 
East Anglia. We are assured that the two last named were created 
dukes by Edward Confessor; but this is doubtful. These titles were 
probably all self-assumed, as was that of the duke of Brittany, until 
the king of France, by the fall of the Sacred empire, acquired the 
right to create a duke, and until (so far as the Breton title is con- 
cerned) it was legalized by Phillip III., in 1297. " 

Slavery. The principal classes of slavery which existed under the 
Sacred constitution continued to exist under that of the Medieval 
empire. Such modification as occurred in the condition of the slaves 
has already been noticed in the chapters on the Feudal system. " 
It has been held by some writers that the introduction of Christian- 
ity ameliorated the condition of slavery in the Roman empire. 
There is no evidence whatever to support such a view. On the con- 
trary, the clergy, when they adopted that form of religion which in 
the dark ages passed for Christianity, took over all the real and per- 
sonal effects of paganism: temples, treasure, land and slaves. The 
institutes of the pseudo-Christian Justinian are filled with provisions 
designed to protect slavery, while the latter was maintained by the 
church for its own advantage. *^ Instead of discouraging it, the evi- 
dence goes to prove that the pseudo-Christians of the period zealously 
encouraged slavery. In the eighth century Alcuin, an English bishop 
at the court of Charlemagne, held no less than twenty thousand per- 
sons in bondage ; and scarcely fewer numbers were held by some other 
prelates. It was not uncommon for free men to surrender their lib- 
erty to bishops or abbots, that they might be taken under the pro- 
tection of the saints. *^ These oblati were so numerous that they 
were divided into three classes, vassali, censuales and ministeriales. 
At the beginning of the eleventh century the greater part of the com- 

** Brady, 11, 132, 182; Henry's History of Britain, 11, i, 27S. 

^ The institution of Patronage in the ninth century is mentioned elsewhere in the 
present work. *^ See Dr. Robertson, Note xx, and Fustel de Coulanges, passim. 

*^ Du Cange, voc. oblatus, iv, 12S6; Mabillondere Diplomat., vi, 632; Potgiesserus 
de statu servorum, i, i, 6, 7. 



228 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

monalty in France were slaves. " The same was the case in England. " 
The representations of Charlemagne to the pope and the capitulary 
of his brother Carloman, ut mancipia Christiana paganis non vendan- 
tur, may have had some effect in abating the sale of Christian slaves 
to pagans, but even this is doubtful, for as a matter of fact the Vene- 
tian trade consisted largely of Christian slaves in exchange for oriental 
merchandise. " In England it was very common even after the Con- 
quest to export slaves to Ireland."*' William of Malmesbury and 
Giraldus Cambrensis prefer a still more serious indictment against 
the Christian nobility of England. They are charged with selling to 
foreigners their female servants, after they had themselves made them 
pregnant. 

It was only in later times, after Christianity had undergone so vast 
a process of evolution that it no more resembled the Christianity of 
the dark ages than that did the original worship of idols which sur- 
vives in the names of our week-days, that the church discouraged 
slavery and endeavoured to extirpate it. Ecclesiastical mystery and 
egotism is reluctant to admit evolution, last of all will it admit that 
the church, aye, even that religion itself, is subject to such a law of 
nature; yet for all that, Christianity evolves. It is this evolution which 
constitutes its main basis, its chief glory and the real source of its 
increasing universality and ever extending conquests; and without 
which it would utterly fail to meet the religious aspirations of an ad- 
vancing civilization. 

The Provinces. Throughout the whole of the period from the es- 
tablishment of the hierarchy by Julius Caesar to the christianization 
of its laws by Justinian, the feudalizing process, which is the necessary 
consequence of such a form of government, had continually removed 
the provinces further and further away from central control. When 
the pontificate seceded from the Basileus and the Medieval empire 
arose, the western provinces, though lawfully subject to the latter, 
were, by the feudal process, so far removed from its practical control, 
that it was only on important occasions that their true relation was 
manifested. Still more distant had the provinces become removed 
from the Sacred empire of Julius, which now seemed to them but a 
speck on the distant horizon of time. Yet though faint, the marks of 
their ancient relationship were still to be discerned Until the year 
1204 we shall find that the Medieval empire, whether personated by 
pope or emperor, respected certain prerogatives of the Sacred empire, 

" Montesquieu, xxx, 11. ** Brady, Pref. to General History. 

■** Hallam, chapter ix, part I, fin. 



CONSTITUTION OF THE MEDIEVAL EMPIRE. 229 

and that the provinces acknowledged and respected the prerogatives 
and suzerainty of both empires, the Sacred and the Medieval. 

Free Cities. During the medieval ages certain cities, whose privi- 
leges or immunities became the subject of legal investigation, proved 
before the courts of law that they had enjoyed them "from the times 
of the Romans. " '" This fact alone negatives the notion that the Sacred 
empire had perished, or that, as Mr. Bryce suggests, the people of 
western Europe were ignorant of its existence. The right to establish 
cities and grant municipal privileges, which Pfeffel's imaginary con- 
stitution confers upon the ecclesiastical Diet and the emperor of the 
West, must therefore in reality be limited by the extent to which 
municipal privileges had previously been granted by the Sacred, and 
acknowledged by the Western, empire. It is plain that the same 
privileges could not legally be conferred by both empires, and that, 
for example, had the Sacred empire anciently chosen to grant free- 
dom to all the municipalities then extant, the power of the Western 
emperor to make such grants must have been limited to such new 
cities as he himself constructed or established. 

Fairs, Weekly or church-day fairs, or wakes, were held during the 
Medieval ages, as in pagan times, under the auspices of the church, 
to which they yielded a revenue." Originally these were held on the 
ninth day ; afterwards on the seventh. Appleton mentions fairs during 
the reign of Dagobert in France, while Dr. Henry treats those of the 
heptarchical period in England. '^^ The Smithfieldfair was established 
during the twelfth century for the benefit of the priory and hospital 
of St. Bartholomew in Smithfield. Church-day fairs were not abol- 
ished until the fourteenth or fifteenth century. In England they were 
forbidden by 27 Henry VI., c. 5 (1448), except as to four Sundays in 
harvest time. This last vestige of a custom which began in the very 
dawn of history was not swept away until 1850.^^ Great fairs are men- 
tioned in extant texts as having been established by the emperors 
(among other places) in Italy during the fifth century, at Aix-la-Cha- 
pelle and Troyes in the eighth century, in Saxony and Flanders about 
960, "* and in Novogorod about 1050. "^ At these fairs slaves were sold, 
as well as merchandise. Fairs were regulated by the emperor Charle- 
magne in 800, and by pope Gregory VII. in 1078. It is quite evident 
that both as to church-day fairs and great fairs the Medieval empire 

^^ De Bos, 11, 333; Robertson, Note xvi. *' Guizot, Hist. Civ., vol. ni. 

^"^ History Britain, ii, i, 261. ^^ Act 13 Victoria, c. 23. 

"AnnalesFiandrige year 958, printed at Frankfort, 1580; Anderson's Hist. Com.. 1,98. 

" Flateyjar-bok, i, 577. 



230 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

simply continued the provisions of the Sacred constitution. Brussel ^* 
informs us that in the tenth century the rents of fairs were commonly 
feudalized. In fact throughout many parts of the empire this process 
had taken place ages before; in some parts it did not occur, so far as 
is now known, until after the tenth century. The fairs of Wessex 
were regulated by Alfred in 886, and of England by William I., in 107 1. 
In the former case the regulation was probably made with, and in the 
latter without, imperial or pontifical authority. 

Right of War, Peace and Treaties. These prerogatives, though 
they properly belonged to the Medieval emperors, were far more often 
exercised by the popes. Notwithstanding the prophecies of Daniel, 
the Sibyls, Virgil, etc., peace and good-will among men seemed as 
distant during the Medieval age as ever. Western Christendom was 
surrounded by heretical Spain, Gotland, Saxony, Hungary and Sar- 
matia. " Within, it was governed by princes more intent upon strength- 
ening their own local power than fortifying and extending the domain 
of Christ. In seceding from the Basileus the pontificate had assumed 
a responsibility which can only be measured by the danger of again 
seeing Europe revert to the abominable worship of the emperors; a 
danger that always haunted the Christian church and from which it 
could only hope to escape by undermining the imperial throne, weak- 
ening its power, dividing its dominions, and encouraging the disobe- 
dience of its vassals. If the papal history of Christianity is true, if 
Christianity was predicted by inspired prophets and descended from 
the Jews, then its government during the dark and Medieval ages (we 
refrain from any more sweeping characterization) has no apology. But 
if, as indicated by the more reliable testimony of archaeology, it was 
essentially a moral revolt against Caesarism, then there is much to 
palliate the transactions of this period. If the mission of Christianity 
was to improve the religion of such men as Cicero, Pliny and Marcus 
Aurelius, or to keep alive the ancient Greek hatred for non-conform- 
ists, there is no plea to mitigate the manifold crimes which were com- 
mitted or instigated by the Medieval popes. It is only upon the theory 
that the pontificate honestly feared a resurrection of Csesarism that 
the end justified, even to those ages, the bloody and execrable means, 
which were too often employed to uphold the new religion. To main- 
tain continual discord between the vassals of the Western empire, to 
prevent their uniting in its support, to dethrone and intern them in 

^^ Usage General des Fiefs, i, 42, cited in Guizot, iii, 37. 

*' Spain and Portugal were in the hands of the Moslem; Saxony had been recovered 
by the Goths, and Hungary by the Avars. 



CONSTITUTION OF THE MEDIEVAL EMPIRE. 23 1 

convents, aye, even to mark them out for slaughter, while openly play- 
ing the part of peacemaker and accepting rewards for composing quar- 
rels which itself had fomented, these were some of the functions of the 
Latin pontificate. Among the means necessary to the performance 
of these functions (there are others which are known to historical stu- 
dents, but over which charity prefers to draw a veil) were the right 
to declare war, peace and alliances. 

Trial by Jury. The essence of this institution is the determination 
of questions at law by a body selected from among the people for that 
purpose, who, after their work is done, return to the people without 
retaining permanent office. The number of jurymen is of no essential 
consequence. No such custom appears in the Asiatic codes. The in- 
stitudes of Solon provided for a large body of dicasts selected by the 
archon from among the freemen of Athens, and actions-at-law were 
heard and determined by a smaller body of dicasts selected from the 
whole body for this purpose. This smaller body we would now call a 
petit, traverse, or trial jury. The dicasts were sworn to discharge their 
duty faithfully, and during trials were presided over by a permanent 
magistrate. The Roman system of judices, evidently copied from the 
institutes of Solon, was of precisely the same character. Such judices 
determined not only the facts, but sometimes also the law; although 
this was usually laid down to them, at the outset of the trial, by the 
presiding magistrate, in explaining the consequences that would fol- 
low their verdict. The smaller body selected to try a cause was usually 
composed of ten men. Under the Sacred constitution this system sub- 
stantially expired, yet that some shadow of it remained is attested in 
the numerous allusions of Tacitus, Suetonius and other authors of the 
Augustan period. This was the time when most probably the few cases 
now referred to a jury were adjudged by twelve, instead of ten judices, 
as formerly; for it was partly during the Augustan period that twelve 
assumed the mystic importance previously accorded to ten. Twelve 
was the number of compurgators or guarantors (juare duodecima 
manu) who were required to swear to the innocence of the accused 
under the canon law of the sixth century.'^ The system of compur- 

*^ Sir Francis Palgrave fancies he sees the twelve jurymen in the twelve headmen of 
Asgard, whom Woden nominated to " doom the land's law." But it is quite evident 
that many of the mysteries found in the Sagas are either, like Gothic coins, architec- 
ture, etc., mere barbarian distortions of Greek or Roman originals, or else that they 
were all derived from a common Oriental source. The jury system was so unfamiliar 
to the Goths that it was only introduced into Norway about the year 1890, and it is by 
no means well established there yet. 



232 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

gators also essentially differed from that of the judices. The compur- 
gators were witnesses, not judges; they constituted a body of twelve 
persons who were supposed to know the facts of the case, or who, 
whether they knew them or not, were ready to testify concerning 
them, and who alone were permitted to do so. This institution of wit- 
nesses prevailed throughout the Roman empire, including Britain, 
down to the thirteenth century, when, in common with many other 
canonical institutes, it began to undergo modifications in the several 
states which now first asserted their independence. Glanville, who 
wrote during the reign of Henry II. , ascribes some modifications then 
made in the witness system to the ' ' goodness " of the reigning prince ; 
but it is well ascertained that down to the fifteenth century the so- 
called jury of twelve were themselves the witnesses and the only wit- 
nesses permitted in the trial ; so that the modification alluded to could 
hardly have been of essential importance. In Magna Charta the ju- 
dicium parium "^ meant the well-known feudal custom of the lord and 
a body of his vassals trying disputes between other of his vassals ; -and 
did not mean a trial by jury in either the ancient (or most modern) 
sense, juratores being mentioned elsewhere in that instrument. It is 
quite possible that the alternate phrase, per legem terrs, was intended 
to include trial by jury of actual witnesses, and was in fact the modifica- 
tion to which Glanville alludes. In such case it was not overridden by 
the compurgator practice of the common law, until the sera of free- 
dom inaugurated by Edward III., rendered the ancient Roman system 
of jurymen a permanent institution of English law."" 

The Calendar. The Sacred prerogative to fix or alter the sera and 
calendar descended in an unbroken line from thepontifex "Numa"to 
the pontifex Julius Csesar, and from the pontifex Julius Csesar to the 
pontifex Isaac II. It was afterwards picked up by the Latin popes, of 
whom Gregory XIII. was the last to exercise it. 

Foreign Ambassadors, The Benedictine compilers of L'art de Veri-^ 
fier les dates claim that the Jus Legationis was exercised by Pope Greg- 
ory III., and the statement has been carelessly repeated by all sub- 
sequent chronologists. This prerogative belonged to and was exercised 
by the sovereign-pontiff of the empire. In the reign of Charlemagne 
it was assumed by that monarch. His embassy sent to Haroun al Ras- 
chid is an instance of its exercise. It was not until after the pontificate 
had usurped the throne and prerogatives of Charlemagne, that it ex- 

^'Nisi per legale judicium parium suorum vel per legem terras, i. f., " Unless by 
lawful trial of his peers," not trial by jury. 

*** For further information on this subject see my " Ancient Britain." 



CONSTITUTION OF THE MEDIEVAL EMPIRE. 233 

ercised the power to treat with foreign nations and to send to them 
legates or ambassadors. Under the Medieval constitution the pope 
and emperor, sometimes alternately, sometimes conjointly, exercised 
this prerogative, until the Fall of Constantinople, when the tie that 
bound them to the Sacred empire having been destroyed, the western 
princes found themselves free to appoint ambassadors, each on his 
own account. Among the earliest foreign embassies appointed by any 
of the subsidiary Christian powers was that headed by William de 
Rubruquis, a Franciscan monk, who was sent in 1253 by Louis IX., of 
France, to treat with the Mongol princes Batu and Mangu Khan. An 
account of this mission appears in the first volume of Hakluyt. 

Trade Corporations. The evolution of trade corporations from the 
period assigned to Numa, their sacerdotal government under the early 
Monarchy, their secularization and suppression by the Commonwealth, 
and their restoration and subjection to sacerdotal authority under the 
Empire, has been treated in previous chapters. They retained the last 
named position in the laws of the Medieval empire. As the Sacred 
empire drew to its close, trade-guilds are said to have made their ap- 
pearance in the Italian republics; in the history of the free city of 
Hamburg they are mentioned so early as 1 135 ; but it is by no means 
certain that these dates are not founded merely in the vain but com- 
mon desire of historians to exaggerate the antiquity of their national 
institutes. That the pagans created trade-guilds is not denied, but 
since within the Roman empire their creation was a prerogative of the 
sacerdotal function, it is difhcult to see whence proceeded the au- 
thority to constitute a corporate body in a Christian state until after 
the Fall of Constantinople. Whatever may have been the case in the 
*' republics " of Venice or Hamburg, it remains the fact that no Chris- 
tian prince, other than the emperor or pope, ever created a corpora- 
tive body until after that period. The earliest trade-guilds of London 
were authorized by Edward III. 

Navigation Laws. The Roman navigation acts were repeated in the 
Laws of Oleron, which have been ascribed to a period so early as the 
reign of Richard I., but it is more likely that in point of time they 
followed the Consolato del Mare which was promulgated at Barcelona 
early in the thirteenth century. In 1379 Richard II. enacted a statute 
which prohibited the king's subjects from iinporting or exporting mer- 
chandise except in English ships, probably only the repetition of an 
ordinance of one of the Edwards. To the reign of the latter must 
therefore, with the greatest probability, be ascribed the earliest of 
those acts, which, following the example of Rome, had for their most 



234 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

for their most important object, the monopoly of the coasting and 
colonial trade. 

^^ Public Notaries. Both the civil and ecclesiastical lawyers of the 
Medieval age agreed in the belief that all public notaries throughout 
the Western empire, in order to render their records, writings and at- 
testations valid, should hold their commissions from either the emperor 
or the pope. This continued to be the legal practice in Scotland until 
the reign of James III., 1460-87. Even after that time the public no- 
taries of that country continued to style themselves " Ego M. auctori- 
tate imperiali [or papali) notarius. " " 

Doctors of Law: Bankers. Irnerius, an Italian jurisconcult of the 
twelfth century and chancellor to the emperor Lotharius, is frequently 
described as the ' ' restorer of the Roman law. " This is saying too much. 
He was the first of the glossators and in that capacity he did much to 
restore the corrupted text of the law. But the restoration of the Civil 
law, meaning its re-instatement as the rule of action for the inhabi- 
tants of the Western empire, was the result not of any one man's ef- 
forts: it was a great political event, the consequence of the Fall of 
Constantinople and of the assertion of their independence by the nu- 
merous western princes who thitherto had remained in vassalage to 
Rome. Down to that time the law which had substantially governed 
the Western "kingdoms," ever since the death of Charlemagne, was 
not the Civil law, but the ecclesiastical statutes invented or formu- 
lated by Dionysius Exiguus, forged by Isidore of Metz, amplified by 
the Latin popes and codified in 115 1 by the Tuscan monk Gratian, in 
the "Concordantia Discordantium Canonum." This code covered or 
was construed to cover nearly every incident of social life; so that 
when a man was asked, as he was in France and Italy, by what law 
he would prefer to be governed, whether Longobardian, Salic, or Ger- 
man (Alemannorum) the question was almost a sarcasm, seeing that 
the canon law left him but little to choose. ^^ The papal registers of 
this period have not been permitted to see the light; but for the cen- 
tury which followed it, Mr. Bliss and other writers have been kindly 
supplied with materials by the clever gentlemen who control the Vati- 
can collection. *' Their object in permitting this publication is evi- 
dently with the view to establish the claim that the almost absolute 
control of the Western "kingdoms" exercised by the papacy began 

*' Bryce, i88«; Selden, Titles of Honour, part i. chapter ii. 
*^ See my "Ancient Britain," chap, vni, g. 

^* " Calendar of Entries in the Papal Registers relating to Great Britain and Ireland, 
1198-1304," edited by W. H. Bliss, B. C. L., London, 1894. 



CONSTITUTION OF THE MEDIEVAL EMPIRE. 235 

in a remote past and continued onward into an indefinite future. But 
that is precisely what it did not do. It began with the papal usurpa- 
tion of Charlemagne's prerogatives and it definitively ended with the 
Fall of Constantinople in 1 204. Its exercise after this date was a con- 
tinual diminuendo ; and so far as England is concerned but feeble traces 
of it remained after the accession of the Plantagenets. Among the 
many false institutes and legal fictions that fell with the Empire was 
the canon law of Rome and the empty choice which it left to the free- 
man of living under codes of law which it had divested of any force. 
When Constantinople fell, the whole of Christendom, as though by 
concerted action, took refuge under the Civil law; and until this was 
modified by the numerous statutes which each kingdom now proceeded 
to enact for itself, ®* it remained the only law which governed the 
states of the Western world. It was the enactment of these local stat- 
utes that demanded a legislature and that led to the creation of par- 
liaments, which, as to any period before the year 1204, claim existence 
only in the imagination of those patriotic writers who would manu- 
facture parliaments, without power either to make laws or to enforce 
them. It is the same with lawyers. Until the Fall of the Empire there 
was no Civil law and consequently there were no civil lawyers." The 
law was divine and infallible; its interpreters and executioners were 
alike divine and infallible and there was little place either for reason 
or reasoners. The early teachers of the Civil law, like Ivan of Char- 
tres; Irnerius, of Bologna; Theobald, of Normandy; Vicarius, of Bo- 
logna ; and Placentius, of Montpelier, were doctors or professors, rather 
than advocates or attorneys; and when the rehabilitation of the civil 
law had proceeded so far as to require the services of practical men, 
the Empire was /lors de combat diud the attorneys were appointed by the 
royal power in each state for itself. The earliest attorneys in Eng- 
land are mentioned in the Court Rolls of 14 Henry III., (A. D. 1225,) 
but it does not appear from the rolls whether they were professional 
attorneys, that is to say, officers of the Court, or merely friends of the 
persons cited to appear. In 52 Henry III., '' John de Bayliol con- 
stituted before the king two persons to be his attorneys, ad lucrandum 
vel perdendum, in a plea depending before the barons (of the Ex- 

^^ The remarkable synchronism of these great events does not seem to have arrested 
the attention of historians. The Etablissements of St. Louis, 1226-70, the Siete 
Partidas of Alfonso X., 1256-75, and the statutes of Edward I., DeReligiosis (statute 
of mortmain) De Donis and Quia Emptores.were all enacted about the same time; i. e., 
shortly after the Fall of Constantinople. 

*^ In 1220 Pope Honorius III. forbade the delivery of lectures on the civil law in 
Paris. 



236 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

chequer) between the said John and John de Somerleyton and others 
named in the original writ for a debt of XI libras, which the said John 
de Bayliol demanded of them, therefore the king commands the bar- 
ons that they do admit the said persons or either of them (if both of 
them cannot be present) to be attorneys for the said John de Bay- 
liol." "" Notwithstanding the phrase adlucrandum vel perdendum the 
fact that these attorneys had to be appointed especially for this case 
by the king, proves that they were not officers of the court. The ear- 
liest instance of persons thus qualified occurs in the reign of Edward I. 
Their designation was apprentices and counsellors at law. The latter 
are mentioned in the statute of 1284. (jj Edward I.) These officers 
were followed in 1391,(20 Edward I.,) by barristers, or persons qual- 
ified to plead within the bar. 

With regard to bankers, so long as the power of the Basileus re- 
mained, no banking seems to have been permitted throughout the 
empire; for his control of the monetary system made him the banker 
of Christendom, and it is not likely that he voluntarily relinquished 
so valuable a monopoly. The Camera degli Imprestidi of Venice was 
the only institution that had the appearance of a bank which was 
erected before the fall of the Basileus ; after that event, banks became 
numerous. But the Camera of Venice, though it afterwards became 
a bank, was essentially not a bank at the period in question: a fact 
which the author has sufficiently demonstrated in another work. *' For 
these reasons there seems to be warrant for the belief that the ap- 
pointment of bankers or the granting of permission to receive deposits 
of money and to lend the same upon interest, was an imperial pre- 
rogative, which only fell to the royal houses of Europe after the de- 
struction of the Roman imperial power in 1204. 

Such were the principal features of the Medieval imperial Consti- 
tion previous to the Fall of Constantinople; not as drawn by Guelph 
or Ghibelline, nor as depicted in forged or mutilated scriptures, but 
as indicated in the powersactually exercised by the two sovereigns — 
emperor and pope — who conjointly or alternately, openly or secretly, 
swayed its sceptre. Behind this anomalous empire stood the shadow 
of the ancient one, a shadow which daily grew shorter and vanished 
altogether when the power and splendour of the Roman pontificate 
reached its short-lived zenith. However, so long as the Eastern empire 
actually lasted, it claimed and exercised a powerful influence upon the 
affairs of Christendom, an influence which the Church would fain ignore, 
but which science, having no false pride of origin, will try and restore 
*^ Madox, II, 79-81. " " Money and Civilization," p. 31. 



CONSTITUTION OF THE MEDIEVAL EMPIRE. 237 

to its proper place in history. When this Constitution is compared 
with that of the empire of Augustus it is impossible not to be con- 
vinced that both relate to the same body-politic, that both are essen- 
tially one, and that they only differ as the same individual differs in 
the journey from manhood and virility to old age and decrepitude. 
In short, the Medieval empire was simply an evolution of the Sacred 
empire erected by Julius Caesar and established by his adopted son. 
Jewry. The right to deal with the Jews, to withhold or grant 
them charters permitting them to enjoy and practice the rites of their 
peculiar religion, with or without conditions, the right to tallage or 
tax them, or to banish them from the empire, seems also to have been 
retained in the hands of the emperor of Rome,althongh on these points 
the author is not able to speak with confidence. Such rights were cer- 
tainly exercised by all the emperors of Rome from Julius to Hadrian, 
and probably by succeeding emperors down to the eighth century. At 
a later period they were exercised by the emperors of the Western or 
Medieval empire, while they do not appear to have been claimed by 
the various potentates of the disrupted Roman empire until after the 
Fall of Constantinople. There are numerous instances of Jewish per- 
secution and massacres previous to 1 204, but no case of Jewish banish- 
ment until after that date; so that it would appear that this unhappy 
people were, in a measure, protected by imperial charters until after 
the empire itself had fallen. Should this view prove to be correct, it 
would still further corroborate the position that the kings of the Eu- 
ropean states were not independent sovereigns. This is an interesting 
topic and worthy of much greater attention than the author has been 
enabled to devote to its elucidation. 



238 



CHAPTER XII. 

DESTRUCTION OF THE SACERDOTAL EMPIRE. 

The pope resolves to destroy the empire of Augustus — League with the Normans 
of Apulia — Robert Guiscard marches upon Constantinople — Upon learning his design, 
Henry IV. besieges Rome — The pope recalls Guiscard to Italy, and the attempt upon 
Constantinople is temporarily abandoned — A second attempt is frustrated by the Venet- 
ians — The design is subsequently revived — Pretext — Story of Alexis III. — Schism — 
Means employed — The Fourth Crusade — Last view of the Sacred empire — Its territory 
— Wealth — Population — Army — Revenues — The papal armament — Attack upon Con- 
stantinople — Fall of the Sacred empire. 

IN the course of that dark struggle between pope and emperor which 
characterized the interval between the Treaty of Seltz and the con- 
quest of Italy by Otto I. , both the combatants had become exhausted. 
The pontificate had broken up the Prankish empire, while the Prankish 
empire had broken up the pontificate. This was the period when the 
guilty lovers and offspring of the infamous Theodora and Marozia pol- 
luted the pontifical chair. With Otto's assumption of the imperial title 
and prerogatives the struggle was renewed. The fact that the sover- 
eigns of the Medieval empire were now no longer Franks but Germans 
had nothing whatever to do with the merits of this contest. So long 
as the empire remained an empire at all, and this was certainly the 
case down to the thirteenth century, its contests with the pontificate 
arose out of their mutual claim to the hierarchical crown of Julius 
Caesar, Augustus and Constantine, all of whom had been both em- 
perors and high-priests of Rome. Many modern writers, misled by 
the anachronical literature which has been created on this subject, 
have represented the Medieval emperors as little better than lunatics, 
whose lives and opportunities were wasted in attempts to grasp the 
sceptre of an useless and shadowy empire. But in fact there was 
nothing shadowy about it. The throne of the West meant not merely 
an additional title for the kings of France or Germany who might fill 
it; it meant the practical suzerainty of all western Christendom; and 
until this idea is fully grasped by historians we may expect no altera- 
tion of the old impossible pictures of idiotic monarchs riding to the 
devil after ghostly sceptres and mythical crowns. 



DESTUCTION OF THE SACERDOTAL EMPIRE. 239 

In the contest for this suzerainty, which the emperors claimed by 
right of conquest and the Treaty of Seltz, and the popes claimed under 
the Forged Decretals, it became a settled conviction of the pontificate 
that no permanent victory could be achieved until the Sacred empire 
was destroyed. Two centuries had been spent in breaking up the em- 
pire of Pepin, yet here in 962 was the pope compelled to crown Otto 
as emperor of the West and to acknowledge himself his vassal. The 
power which impelled the pontiff to this humiliating attitude was not 
brute strength, not merely military superiority. Of that sort of power, 
be it said to the credit of Christ's champions, they rarely had any fear. 
They possessed weapons which, in ages of ignorance and credulity, 
were far more effective than swords and spears, and they well knew 
how to use them. What they did fear was the tripartite Settlement of 
Seltz : the rights which the emperors of the West had lawfully acquired 
from a source whose legitimacy no pontiff had ever ventured to ques- 
tion. The fruits of conquest had been and might again be feudalized 
and subdued, but the Settlement was a fruit which could never be dis- 
posed of until the tree that bore it was levelled to the ground.' 

Hence the encouragement which the popes, at first secretly, then 
openly, extended to those Norman heretics, adventurers and dare- 
devils who, in the eleventh century, invaded and conquered Apulia and 
other portions of the Byzantine possessions in Italy. The good under- 
standing between these strange allies was only interrupted once, and 
then soon resumed. When Robert Guiscard, after having made a pris- 
oner of the pope, kissed his captive's feet, we may well believe that the 
price of this degrading submission had been satisfactorily arranged in 
advance. Ostensibly, Guiscard vowed fealty to his enemy and agreed 
to pay him an annual tribute of twelve Pavian pence upon each pair 
of oxen in Apulia, a territory which was already his own by right of 
conquest and possession.^ Secretly, we may believe, this was but the 
prelude to the conquest of Constantinople. To the priest, this meant 
the empire of Christendom; to the soldier of fortune, plenty of spoil. 
One had secured an instrument upon whose credulity he might play 
and upon whose valour and fidelity he might rely; the other, a warrant 
for a conquest, which might enable him to indefinitely multiply his 
resources. Both may have been well satisfied with the bargain and the 

' When Godfrey of Bouillon's army of Crusaders arrived near Constantinople on its 
way to Palestine, bishop Monteil, the pope's legate, who accompanied the army, strenu- 
ously urged Godfrey to besiege "that city which was the residence of the Chief of all 
the Christian princes." Voltaire, General History, i, 270. 

^Voltaire, General History, i, 161. Year A. D. 1059. 



240 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

prospect. At all events, the pontificate immediately afterwards re- 
nounced the tripartite treaty which had been made with the Eastern 
and Western empires, and thus threw open to the eager Normans the 
coveted road to Constantinople. 

Though Guiscard was but a blind instrument in this vast design, 
Henry IV. was no dupe to it and fully understood its significance. The 
Eastern had all along formed a buffer to the Western empire against 
the ambitious designs of the Roman pontificate. The suppression of 
the Basileus would exalt the lawful authority and power of the pope 
to a point where it might remain forever secure from molestation or 
restraint. The fall of the Eastern empire meant the irrevocable sub- 
jection of the Western. There was no time to lose. Hastily explaining 
the crisis to his vassals, Henry summoned an army together, mounted 
the Alps, descended into Italy, laid siege to Rome, and attacked that 
lofty tomb of the pagan emperor Hadrian, within whose strong walls 
the pontiff had now sought refuge. 

The immediate consequence of this move was the recall of Robert 
Guiscard, who had all but succeeded in reaching Constantinople, and 
who was now wanted in Italy to beat off the emperor. After great 
exertions by the tireless pope and his Norman mercenaries, this task 
was finally accomplished, and by the year 1 084 the latter were prepared 
to again march upon Constantinople. On this occasion we have more 
positive evide.nce of the understanding between the papacy and the 
Norman chieftain. The former agreed to confer upon Guiscard noth- 
ing less than the kingdoms of Greece and Asia, and to exact nothing 
more in return than the formality of feudal submission. ' But Guiscard, 
although he knew too little of Roman history to understand the sig- 
nificance of the undertaking to which he had devoted his arm, was not 
so innocent of the arts of duplicity as to walk blindly into this trap. 
His objects were not a desolated land, a barren throne and a feudal 
dependence, which would probably be greatly aggravated by succes- 
sive popes, but plenty of spoil in hand for himself and his hardy fol- 
lowers. The Norman's estimation of the imperial crown, like his 
estimation of the imperial money, was limited strictly to the metal of 
which it was composed. Accordingly, his operations were directed not 
so much against well-defended Constantinople, as the ill-garrisoned 
but rich islands of the Archipelago. 

This time a new defender appeared on behalf of the Sacred empire. 
The Basileus in his despair invoked the assistance of his Venetian 

^ Anna Comnena, Alexiad, lib. i, p. 32. The Apulian, lib. iv, p. 270. " Romani 
regni sibi promisissi coronum Papa serebatur." Gibbon, v, 623. 



DESTRUCTION OF THE SACERDOTAL EMPIRE. 241 

Vassals. Lying between the Eastern and Western empires, Venice had 
profited by their separation and thriven upon their quarrels. Though 
she had never failed to acknowledge her submission to the Basileus, 
she had more than once profited by his necessities. The price de- 
manded on the present occasion, though something enormous, re- 
ceived the assent of the Sacred court; it was no less than permission 
to share in that coveted trade of the Orient which the Greeks had 
hitherto unwillingly divided with the Arabians. For this considera- 
tion, to be paid after the repulse of the Normans, the Venetians, in 
1085, despatched an armed fleet to the Archipelago, which soon put 
an end to the marauding expedition of Guiscard and with it, for the 
present, to the designs of the pope. But, though laid aside, this design 
was not relinquished. Men die, but corporations live. Guiscard died, 
Henry died, Gregory died, but the Latin See continued; and it only 
awaited a favourable opportunity to exorcise that apparition of the 
Sacred empire, which was still strong enough, both in arms and in 
documentary proofs, to prevent it from claiming the suzerainty of 
Christendom.* 

Such an opportunity occurred toward the close of the following cent- 
ury. There was a crime to punish, an exiled prince of the Sacred line 
to restore, the Holy Land to redeem from infidels, a schism to heal in 
Christianity, and an empire to sack. The pretext of a crusade, though 
insufficient to convince men like Matthew Paris, who lived on the 
ecclesiastical stage and sometimes lent a hand in shifting the scenic 

* The Roman fable of Prester John, which was promulgated in the eleventh century, 
the appearance of Dominican monks in Tartary during the twelfth century, the irrup- 
tion of the Mongols shortly after the opening of the thirteenth century, the sack of 
Constantinople by the Latin forces in 1204, the Mongol invasion and subversion of the 
caliphate of Baghdad by the grandson of Genghis Khan in 1258, all suggest that the 
pope used pressure from the eastward; in other words, that the Tartar and Turkish 
invasions were promoted by the Latin See. Indeed, the monk Carpini, in 1246, was 
instructed to invite these barbarians to attack the Moslems; and it is quite probable 
that at an earlier period they were in like manner invited to attack the Greeks. It was 
the pope, (Benedict VIII.,) who encouraged the Normans in Italy, and there isastrong 
suspicion that it was also the pope who summoned the Mongols to destroy the Sacerdotal 
empire. The object in both cases was the same; and this object the Latin College 
omitted no means to accomplish. Peter of Leon, the son of a wealthy Jew, was elected 
pope of Rome in 1 130, and remained on the pontifical throne until 1138, when he died. 
His sacramental title was Anacletus II. His wealth and the sword of Roger, king of 
Sicily, proved his palladium. His rival, afterwards known as Innocent II., fled to the 
court of Lothaire II., and bribing him with the usufruct of the domains granted to the 
papacy by the Countess Matilda, secured a champion who, upon the death of Anacletus, 
placed him upon the papal throne. The deed executed by Innocent II. bears the date 
of June 13, 1133. Voltaire, I, 212. 



242 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

illusions, were enough for the rest of the world and more than enough 
for the Normans, to whom the word sack always had the effect of a 
galvanic battery. 

The crime which had enlisted the benevolent interest of the Latin 
pope was that of Alexis III. While the Sacred emperor, Isaac II. , was 
absent in Thrace the crown was usurped by his brother, Alexis Angelas, 
who, after securing the throne, seized, blinded and thrust his brother 
into a monastic dungeon. The sufferer's son, afterwards Alexis IV., 
then a boy of twelve years of age, escaped on board of an Italian vessel 
to Sicily, whence he made his way to Rome and narrated his case to 
pope Innocent III. To that astute and unscrupulous politician it was 
a lever by which the Western world might be moved. A treaty was at 
once drawn up between the high contracting powers, by which the 
Latin See undertook nothing and the friendless boy promised every- 
thing. " Restore my father to his throne," wrote the lad, "and we 
promise to submit ourselves and our people, in fine, the Eastern empire, 
to the pope, as well as the succour of the Holy Land and a present con- 
tribution of two hundred thousand marks. " As a shibboleth to recruit 
the legions and the treasury of superstition, the Holy Sepulchre, 
though much played-out, had not entirely lost its efficacy. It is true 
that the chivalrous Saladin had thrown open the road to Jerusalem 
without toll or hindrance, and that he had, upon condition of demol- 
ishing the Christian fortress of Ascalon,even granted to the Christians 
the freedom of the coast from Jaffa to Tyre, so that, whatever their 
real object was, they might either visit the sacred relics, or obtain some 
share of the overland trade to India. But these indulgent terms were 
subject to revision. New caliphs might enact new measures. The in- 
fidel banner of the Prophet still waved over the holy city; and, with 
these arguments, all Europe could be invoked to haul it down.* 

The nature and extent of the so-called schism in the Christian church 
and the hopelessness of uniting the Greek and Latin religions had by 
this time become so plain to those in authority, that all attempts to 
bring about such unity must be regarded by the modern student 
rather as political expedients, than the efforts of unsophisticated piety. 
The current which separated these religions bore them farther and 
farther apart. To the doctrines "Substantiality," "Natures" and 

* Notwithstanding all the blood and treasure wasted in the crusades, the banner of 
Mahomet still waves there. On the Saladin tax and tenths levied by the pope in behalf 
of the fourth crusade, see Selden on Titles, ill. ii, 1083. The religious motives which 
induced the Venetians to establish themselves at Tyre will appear more fully as we 
proceed. 



t 

DESTRUCTION OF THE SACERDOTAL EMPIRE. 243 

"Will," which distinguished them in the fourth century, and the dis- 
similar rites and festivals which they celebrated in the seventh, had 
now been added a race hatred, which nothing could hope to reconcile. 
The Greeks had come to regard the Franks with a contempt that 
amounted to loathing. Anna Comnena, represents the Greek abhor- 
rence for the Latins and Franks as due to their filthy habits.^ The 
language of Cinnamus and Nicetas is still more vehement. During the 
Second Crusade the Latin priests had, by permission, offered sacrifices 
upon the altars of the Greek churches. Upon their retirement, the 
Greek priests deemed it necessary to wash and purify the fanes thus 
desecrated by the touch of foul hands. Yet even such offences were 
venial compared with the hideous crimes which the Latins daily com- 
mitted. Dirt is an expiable offence, but not heresy. The Latins, it 
seems, thought nothing of eating the flesh of animals that had been 
killed by strangulation; they consumed blood; they fed on milk and 
cheese during Lent; the infirm of their monasteries were even in- 
dulged in the taste of meats; they cooked with lard instead of oil; 
they fasted on Saturdays; their bishops, like the pagan knights, wore 
rings ; their priests shaved their heads and faces; and the rite of bap- 
tism was performed as in the ancient pagan days.' The hatred of the 
Latins for their Greek brethren, if not based upon similar refinements, 
was none the less vigorous. The latter were not Romans, but Asiat- 
ics; they were not descendants of the gods, but base Scythian and 
Galatian nomads, polished with the veneer of a stolen empire; they 
were cowardly, perfidious, voluptuous and effeminate; their religion 
was little better than the foul worship from which it sprang, and whose 
Mithraic temples and ceremonials still masqueraded under the thin 
veil of so-called Christianity. 

The indulgence which the clergy of the respective races accorded 
to these popular prejudices moulded them into instruments well fitted 
to the hands of jealousy or ambition. In 1054 the pope of Rome sol- 
emnly excommunicated Michael Cerularius, the patriarch of Constan- 
tinople, and instructed his legates to deposit upon the altar of St. Sophia 
a direful anathema, which, after enumerating the seven mortal heresies 
of the Greeks, devoted their guilty teachers and their unhappy sec- 
taries to the eternal tortures of hell." 

During the reign of Alexis II., the Latin inhabitants of Constanti- 
nople, who lived in a quarter especially assigned for their residence, 
were attacked and slaughtered without mercy, neither age nor sex 
being spared. Their houses were reduced to ashes, their clergy burnt 
* Alexiad, i, 31-33. 'Gibbon, vi, 123-4; 126M, ^Gibbon, vi, 126. 



,^ 



244 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

in the churches, and their sick murdered in the hospitals. Four thou- 
sand Roman Christians were sold in perpetual slavery to the Turks. 
In this horrible transaction the Greek priests and monks were active 
ringleaders, and they joined in chanting a hymn of thanksgiving to the 
Lord Jesus when the head of a Roman cardinal, the pope's legate, was 
severed from his body, fastened to a dog's tail, and dragged with sav- 
age mockery through the city.^ 

Greatly as the Sacred empire had been contracted by the encroach- 
ments of the Moslems, it was still one of the most extensive and opulent 
in Europe. It embraced the whole of Greece, Cyprus, Rhodes, Crete 
and the fifty islands of the ^gean Sea ; its inhabitants numbered some 
seven or eight millions; the daily revenues of the crown, according to 
Benjamin of Tudela, amounted to 20,000 besants, a quantity of gold 
more than equal to that contained in 10,000 British sovereigns of the 
present day ; it monopolized through its emperors the lucrative prerog- 
ative of coining gold for the circulation of the entire christian world, 
which gold it exchanged for western silver at 12 and re-exchanged for 
Oriental gold at 6 for i ; until the twelfth century, it also monopolized 
the production and manufacture of silk; it shared with the Arabs the 
entire trade with the Orient; its capital city was a veritable mine of 
gold and silver furniture, priceless vestments, and inestimable gems, 
the stored wealth of an hundred Caesars, derived from endless con- 
quests, exactions, and oppressions. Speaking of the Eastern empire 
in the twelfth century, Voltaire (i, 260) says: "Notwithstanding so 
many losses, notwithstanding the vices and revolutions in the govern- 
ment, the Imperial city, declining indeed, but yet immense, populous, 
opulent, and voluptuous, was certainly, in its own estimation, the first 
city in the world. The inhabitants called themselves Romans, not 
Greeks; their state was the Roman Empire; and the people in the 
West, whom they called Latins, were, in their opinion, barbarians, who 
had revolted from them." In summoning the Fourth Crusade there 
was a brilliant prospect for all the participants; the sceptre of Christ 
for the pope, a recovered kingdom for the aged Isaac and the youthful 
Alexis, the Holy Sepulchre for the devout, the union of the Greek and 
Latin churches for the Roman ecclesiastics, the Oriental trade for the 

'Gibbon, vi, 129. In 1891 a French vSwiss pilgrim, fresh from the elevating influence 
of the Holy Coat of Treves, visited Rome, attended the pope's mass at St. Peter's, and 
thus reinforced with religious zeal, went to the Pantheon and spat upon the register 
containingthenameof Victor Emanuel. In the following year an author and a publisher 
at Treves, whose book alluded to these circumstances and declared the coat to be an 
imposture, were both sent to prison. And yet there are people who dream of philosophy, 
science, truth and the Golden Age! 



DESTRUCTION OF THE SACERDOTAL EMPIRE. 245 

Venetians, and for the Normans and old crusaders — well, as it might 
happen. 

Notwithstanding her subsequent claims to political independence 
it can scarcely be doubted that Venice remained a fief of the Eastern 
empire down to the period of its fall. In 523 Cassiodorus reminded 
the tribunes of Venice not to neglect their annual tribute to the ex- 
arch of Ravenna. In 697 they began to elect their own chief magis- 
trates and even ventured to confer upon them the title of duke or 
doge, assuming what was afterwards regarded as a republican form of 
government; but this mode of appointment was followed in many of 
the provinces hitherto never suspected of being republics; only, in 
such cases, the appointment was subject to the approval of the Em- 
pire. As a matter of fact, the Venetians continued to pay tribute and 
acknowledge vassalage to the Eastern empire, even after the seces- 
sion of the West. The Treaty of Seltz probably left the Venetians in 
the same position. Their attitude in 807 has been depicted in another 
place. In opening a commerce with them at Alexandria the Arabians 
admitted them to a portion of the vast profits of their Indian trade. 
The crusaders augmented their wealth and power, by enabling them 
to give up Alexandria and establish emporia of their own at Antioch 
and Tyre. On the other hand, they were exposed to continual danger 
both from the claims of suzerainty preferred by Frederick Barbarosa, 
the intrigues of the Latin See, and the commercial rivalry of Genoa 
and Pisa; so that it seems probable that they remained, at least nomi- 
nally, subject to the Eastern empire until the reign of Manuel Com- 
nenus. By this time the military protection of the crusaders over 
Antioch and Tyre was abandoned ; the Venetian share of the oriental 
trade hung upon the profits of a factory which they were permitted to 
conduct at Constantinople ; and unless this precarious footing was soon 
bettered there was grave danger that the trade would be lost to them 
altogether. The war of 1 1 50 must be regarded as an attempt of this char- 
acter, but it had ended in 1 1 75 without importants results, and at the 
moment when the benevolent pope of Rome espoused the cause of the 
tender Alexis, the commercial preponderance of Venice trembled in 
the scale of fortune. 

In preparing for this crusade, the cooperation of Venice was indis- 
pensable; its promise of reward was proportionately munificent. The 
terms were arranged by six commissioners, deputed by the feudal 
princes who had devoted themselves to the Cross, and who met in 
Venice to confer with the aged and pious doge, Henry Dandolo. Venice 
was to receive 85,000 marks in advance, one-half of the spoil, and 




THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

one-half of all conquests by sea and land. Nothing was said about 
the Oriental trade, which was worth more than all the rest. On her 
part, Venice was to provide 120 polanders capable of conveying 4, 500 
horses and 9,000 squires or grooms, also 24 transports to carry 4,500 
knights and 2,000 foot-soldiers and a convoy of 50 galleys, all pro- 
visioned for nine months, or provisions enough to fill 70 store-ships. 
Every preparation having been made, this expedition set sail in the 
spring of 1203 and in due time it came to anchor in the harbour of 
Constantinople. Its mere appearance was the signal for the flight of 
the cowardly usurper, the deliverance of the blinded emperor, and the 
restoration of himself and the youthful Alexis to their lawful throne. 

When the services of the allies in this bloodless war came to be paid 
for, great difficulties arose. The crusaders and Venetians were im- 
portunate, the public treasury of Constantinople contained at the time 
but a few besants, and the people of the city were filled with holy in- 
dignation at the promised submission of the Sacred empire to the pope 
of Rome. The youthful Alexis began to perceive that he had prom- 
ised much more than it was possible for his father to perform. During 
the embarrassment which ensued, the holy tumult into which the city 
was thrown, enabled a new usurper named Ducas, or Mourzoukle, 
(Alexis V.,) to gain access to the palace, murder both Isaac and 
Alexis, proclaim himself sovereign of the Sacred empire, and address 
the allies in a tone of lofty superiority. Nothing more was wanted to 
goad the latter to madness. Whatever respect for the traditions of 
the past had hitherto restrained their avidity for the treasures which 
surrounded them on all sides, whatever sentiments of awe or super- 
stition in the presence of the relics and memories sacred to the name 
of Roman or Christian, had to this moment stilled their rude passions, 
were now entirely swept away. The citadel was at once besieged. In 
1204 it was carried by assault, set on fire, and sacked. 

' ' In St. Sophia the silver was stripped from the pulpit, an exquisite 
and highly prized table of oblation was broken in pieces, the sacred 
chalices were turned into drinking cups, the gold fringe was ripped 
off the veil of the sanctuary. Asses and horses were led into the 
churches to carry off the spoil. A prostitute mounted the patriarch's 
throne and sang with indecent gestures a ribald song. The tombs of 
the emperors were rifled and the Byzantines saw, at once with amaze- 
ment and anguish, the embalmed corpse of Justinian — which even de- 
cay and putrefaction had for six centuries spared in his tomb — exposed 
to the violation of the mob. It had been understood among those 
who instigated these atrocious proceedings that the relics were to be 



DESTRUCTION OF THE SACERDOTAL EMPIRE. 247 

brought into a common stock and equitably divided among the con- 
querors; but each ecclesiastic seized and secreted whatever he could. 
The idolatrous state of the Eastern church is illustrated in some of 
these relics. Thus the Abbot Martin obtained for his monastery in 
Alsace the following inestimable articles: A spot of the blood of our 
Saviour; a piece of the true cross; the arm of the apostle James; part 
of the skeleton of John the Baptist; and a bottle of the milk of the 
Mother of God. In contrast with the treasures thus acquired, may 
be set the relics of a very different kind, the remains of ancient art, 
which at the same time they destroyed, namely, the bronze chariot- 
eers from the Hippodrome; the she-wolf suckling Romulus and Re- 
mus; a group of a sphinx, river-horse and crocodile; an eagle tearing 
a serpent; an ass and his driver, originally ordered to be cast by Au- 
gustus in memory of the victory of Actium ; Bellerophon and Pegasus ; 
a bronze obelisk; Paris presenting the apple to Venus; an exquisite 
statue of Helen ; the Hercules of Lysippus and a Juno, (or Bona Dea,) 
formerly taken from the temple at Samos. The bronzes were melted 
into coins, and thousands of manuscripts and parchments were burned. 
From that time the works of many ancient authors disappeared alto- 
gether " and Rome began to write its fabulous history anew. 

" With well-dissembled regret. Innocent took the new order of 
things in the city of Constantinople under his protection. The bishop 
of Rome at last appointed the bishop of Constantinople. The ac- 
knowledgement of papal supremacy was complete. Rome and Venice 
divided between them the ill-gotten gains of their undertaking. If 
anything had been wanting to open the eyes of Europe, surely what 
had thus occurred should have been enough. The pope and the doge 
— the trader in human credulity and the trader of the Adriatic — had 
shared the spoils of a crusade meant by religious men for the relief 
of the Holy Land. The bronze horses, once brought by Augustus 
from Alexandria, after his victory over Antony and transferred from 
Rome to Constantinople by its founder, were set before the Church 
of St. Mark. They were the outward and visible sign of a less obvious 
event that was taking place. For to Venice was brought a residue of 
the literary treasures that had escaped the fire and the destroyer; 
and while her comrades in the outrage were satisfied, in their ignor- 
ance, with fictitious relics, she took possession of the poor remnant 
of the glorious works of art, of letters, and of science. Through these 
was hastened the intellectual progress of the West.'"" 

Thus fell the empire of the Caesars ; and thus perished, by the hands 
^^ Draper's " Intellectual Development of Europe," 11, 56. 



248 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

of Christians, the city holiest of all others to the Christian religion. 
The Franks and Venetians, after slaughtering and stripping the in- 
habitants, robbed the altars of their sacred vessels and even dug up 
the bodies of the dead from the cemetaries, to plunder from them the 
gifts of sorrow and piety. Upon a division of the spoil, the Venetian 
share was valued at 900,000 marks of silver, a sum so trivial and in- 
adequate, as to suggest enormous sequestration on the part of the 
soldiers. The share of territory was of far more importance to the 
new republic, for it secured to it the coveted trade to India. The pont- 
ificate, under whose auspices this expedition had been organized, was 
too well aware of the stupendous consequences that might arise from 
its success, to take an active part in the matter, and even affected 
some show of displeasure at the zeal displayed by the allies. Never- 
theless, in accepting from the Latin emperor Baldwin, what that pup- 
pet of the hourchoosed to style "the restoration of his (the pope's) 
authority in the East," but what was in reality the entire sovereignty 
of Christendom, it accepted and enjoyed its share of the profits. Nor 
was this sovereignty a mere name. The claims of Caesar were now 
hushed forever; and the pontifex-maximus, freed from his faded but 
still tenacious suzerainty, could lay lawful hands not only upon the 
benefices and livings of the East, not only upon the lucrative prerog- 
atives hitherto enjoyed by the Basileus throughout both east and 
west, but also upon that crown of the Sacred empire which proclaimed 
its wearer to be the veritable King of Kings and Lord of the Earth. 



249 



CHAPTER XIII. 

GUELPH AND GHIBELLINE WARS. 

Brief triumph of the Holy See — The Empire takes alarm — Frederick II. — Renewal 
of the Guelph and Ghibelline wars— Contest for the bones of the Sacred empire — Out 
of this contest arises the independence of the feudal princes — The Empire is lost to 
both contestants. 

BUT these hopes proved illusive, for with the Sacred empire fell 
also that Medieval creation which the pope had intended should 
usurp its place. The constitution of the latter empire had not been 
that of a state, but of a struggle. An hierarchy with one head has a 
tendency to slowly feudalize and disintegrate; an hierarchy with two 
heads is a government born to destructive civil wars and rapid decay. 
The peaceable existence of such a monstrosity is impossible. The Med- 
ieval hierarchy owed its creation neither to Buddha, Julius Caesar, 
nor the Donation of St. Peter ; but like the "restored " statues of our 
arch^ological museums, it was a graft of one upon the other,a Christ- 
ian head stuck upon a pagan body. 

Impious as the ancient constitution had been in its demand for the 
worship of Csesar it had at least the merit of being congruous and har- 
monious in all its parts. All powers began and ended with the Sacred 
College, an organization so ancient, so complete, so respectable, that 
from the assumption of the high priesthood by Caesar, down to the 
schism out of which the Medieval empire emerged, the Church was 
enabled to retain the management of all the affairs of state, not only 
benefices, fiefs and revenues, but also marriages, divorces, adoptions, 
burials,testaments, slavery, manumission, and an hundred other insti- 
tutions and incidents of social life, down to the holding of markets 
and fairs, the grinding of corn, and the digging of sewers. So long 
as the emperor and high-priest were one, these prerogatives of the ec- 
clesiastical organization contributed to sustain his power ; the moment 
they became two, the same prerogatives were turned into bones of con- 
tention. In the Medieval constitution this lack of unity and harmony 
came into high relief. Like the religion, the history, the scriptures, 
the statues, the paintings, the coins, the architecture of that age, it 



250 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED, 

was a mere copy of the Sacred constitution, with all the finer parts 
erased. 

The triumph of the Latin See over the fall of Constantinople was 
short-lived. No sooner was the astounding news disseminated through- 
out the Western empire than the latter was thrown into the most vio- 
lent agitation and the contest between emperor and pope was renewed. 
This time Guelph and Ghibelline met to decide the sovereignty not 
merely of the West, but of the entire Roman world, both east and 
west. They met to affirm or condemn the act of Julius Caesar, which 
had converted the republic of Europe into an hierarchy. They met 
to settle the feuds which had arrayed Clovis against Symmachus, 
Ethelbert against Gregory, Charlemagne against Hadrian, and Henry 
against Hildebrand. It was a contest between monarchs who were 
determined to rule a secular state, and pontiffs who saw no salvation 
for mankind but through the medium of an hierarchy. In front of 
this historical background were arrayed the prizes which awaited 
the victors: dominion, authority, the right to govern, to tax, to im- 
pose royalties, to exact seigneurial dues, to reserve the profits of coin- 
age, to buy with one scale and sell with another, the right to lands, 
escheats, mortmain, inheritances, donations, benefices, investitures, 
livings — these formed an array tempting enough to incite the western 
world to the bitterest warfare it had ever undertaken. 

After a preliminary skirmish, in which the pontificate, resorting to 
its ancient tactics, sought to play off Otto against Philip, and only es- 
caped defeat through the mysterious assassination of its enemy, the 
real contest commenced with the advent of Frederick II. This was 
a monarch whom neither the threats nor the wiles of ecclesiastical 
hatred could terrify or deceive. " Out of the long array of the Ger- 
manic successors of Charles, he is, with Otto III., the only one who 
comes before us with a genius and a frame of character that are not 
those of a Northern or a Teuton, There dwelt in him, it is true, all 
the energy and knightly valour of his father Henry and his grandfather 
Barbarosa, But along with these, and changing their direction, were 
other gifts, inherited perhaps from his Italian mother and fostered by 
his education among the o-range groves of Palermo — a love of luxury 
and beauty, an intellect refined, subtle, philosophical. Through the 
mist of calumny and fable it is but dimly that the truth of the man 
can be discerned and the outlines that appear, serve to quicken rather 
than appease the curiosity with which we regard one of the most ex- 
traordinary personages of history. A sensualist, yet also a warrior 
and a politician ; a profound lawgiver and an impassioned poet ; in his 



GUELPH AND GHIBELLINE WARS. 



251 



youth fired by crusading fervour, in later life persecuting heretics while 
himself was accused of blasphemy and unbelief; of winning manners 
and evidently beloved by his followers, but with the stain of more than 
one cruel deed upon his name; he was the marvel of his own genera- 
tion; and succeeding ages looked back with awe, not unmingled with 
pity, upon the inscrutable figure of the last emperor who had braved 
all the terrors of the Church and died beneath her ban; the last who 
had ruled from the sands of the Ocean to the shores of the Sicilian 
sea. But while they pitied, they condemned. The undying hatred of 
the papacy threw around his memory a lurid light; him,and him alone, 
of all the imperial line, Dante the worshipper of the empire, must per- 
force deliver to the flames of hell." ' 

In vain did the council of the Lateran, (12 15,) declare the supre- 
macy of the pope above all earthly sovereigns; in vain did the pont- 
ificate circulate the numismatic proclamation of its newly fledged 
authority, whereon Christ is depicted holding in his left hand a book 
inscribed with the legend : ' 'The vow of the Roman senate and people : 
Rome the Capital of the World! " * To its dismay the Latin See dis- 
covered that it could no longer charm with the name of the Sacred 
empire. Not only had Frederick learnt many things during his sojourn 
in the East, so also had the other crusaders. The Treaty of Seltz was 
buried in the ashes of Constantinople, but its ghost stalked through 
the land and awakened the feudal princes to the consideration of the 
rights it had embodied. So long as the Basileus remained, his authorty 
i« certain matters was never questioned, either by them or by their 
suzerain, the emperor or pope, whichever he had been. But now the 
case was different, and those who were not actually in the struggle be- 
tween these great powers merely awaited its final issue to assume that 
complete independence of both, which they had long desired but had 
never ventured to assert against the traditional policy and superstitious 
veneration of Christendom for the sacred prerogatives of the Basileus. 

In the assertions and proclamations of his claims to supremacy Fred- 
erick was not a whit behind the pope. He called himself Ever Augustus 
and Sacred Emperor ; he alluded to his empire as that of the Ceesars ; 
the peculiar prerogative of supreme rulers, the freedom of cities, 
which Innocent III. , had granted to the municipality of Rome, he sold 
to that of Lubeck f and either to anticipate or match the pope's sacred 
coins of gold, he issued during the same year the magnificent augustals, 
boldly stamped with theeagle of Rome, which constituted thefirstgold 

' Bryce, 207-8. ^ An issue of gold coins. Muratori, 11, 559-69; Gibbon, vi, 537. 
^In 1226, for 60,000 marks a year. Anderson, i, 202. 



252 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

coinage of any Christian prince, except the Basileus, for upwards of 
four hundred years. * The brilliant treatises of Gibbon, Hallam, Bryce 
and others render it superfluous to pursue the story of this memorable 
struggle any farther. In each step of the contest between pope and 
emperor, the coinage of gold will be found, like a park of artillery, 
behind the front rank of the combatants. Its sacerdotal and political 
significance were never lost sight of. Gold coinage was the mark of 
supreme authority. The prince who struck silver might be a vassal to 
some distant pontifex or emperor; but he who struck gold was an ab- 
solute monarch, a sovereign by the grace of God. 

To sustain their respective claims, the contestants also invoked the 
Civil Law ; the school of the learned Bartolus resounded with the doc- 
trine that the emperor of the West was the rightful sovereign of the 
earth, from the rising to the setting of the sun; that he alone could 
lawfully confirm, confer, create or withhold kingdoms, dukedoms, and 
principalities ; and these claims were popularized in the ' ' Saxon Look- 
ing Glass," a work of the twelfth century, but copied m vast numbers 
during the thirteenth and widely circulated and accredited throughout 
northern Europe. On the other hand, Boniface VIII., claimed that 
* ' God had set him over kings and kingdoms, "and that, for example, 
he possessed the right to deprive Philip le Bel of the throne of France 
and confer it upon Albert of Hapsburg. " John XXII., even assumed 
the right to shift the imperial crown from the head of Louis IV. , to that 
of Frederick of Austria; and in response to the Ghibelline theory of 
empire, the see of Rome issued the "Suabian Looking Glass, " which 
became of equal credit in southern .Europe. It maintained that the 
earth was given by God to Christ, by Christ to Peter, and by Peter to 
the pope, who was therefore its lawfully appointed sovereign. This 
was the same pretty doctrine that Pizarro afterwards preached to Ata- 
hualpa, and that was swallowed up and lost in the mighty canyons of 
the Cordilleras. 

* These augustals were struck about 1225, and therefore preceded the Italian florins. 
The former contained 81 to 82 English grains, the latter 56 grains each. The speci- 
mens of augustals in the British Museum appear to be of fine gold. 

* See this Pope's bull in Henry, History Br., iv, ii, 40. Also in Haydn, voc. "Pope." 



'> 



5: 



CHAPTER XIV. 

ENGLAND, A PROVINCE OF THE EMPIRE. 

In the Fifth Century Britain was a sub-province of Roman Gaul — Revolt of all the 
western provinces against vicarious government — Restoration of Roman authority 
under Justinian — Breaking down of the colonial system of government — Steps in the 
severance of Germany from the Roman empire — Supreme sovereignty pretended to 
have been assumed by the pope after the assassination of Maurice — Secession of Italy 
in the reign of Leo the Isaurian — Peter's pence or Rome-scat paid by Ina, papal 
patrician of Wessex — Papal tribute of Ethelred I. — Offa refuses homage to the pont- 
ificate — Crowning of Charlemagne — General acknowledgment of his claim to the 
suzerainty of the Medieval empire — Homage paid him by Offa, Eardwulf and other 
English and Scotch princes — Canute assists at the coronation of Conrad II. — The 
suzerainty of the Medieval empire wielded alternately by emperors and popes — The 
pope confers the Roman province of Britain upon William of Normandy — Stephen, 
Richard I., and John Lackland, all acknowledge vassalage to the Papacy — Crowning 
of Louis VIII., at London — Vassalage of Henry III. to the Papacy — Edward III., 
the last English vassal of the Medieval empire — Vassalage of the Medieval kings of 
France, Spain, Italy, Germany and other provinces of the Medieval empire — Collapse 
of the Roman system in the thirteenth century. 

LONG before the final departure of the Roman legions from Britain, 
that country, without counting Britannia Barbara, was divided 
into six ' petty provinces, and these provinces were embraced in the 
proconsular government of Gaul; so that, true to its vicarious form, 
the Eastern empire ruled the Western, the Western empire ruled Gaul, 
Gaul ruled Britain, and Britain was split into six, or seven, sub-prov- 
inces. The capital of Britain was fixed at Treves so early as the reign 
of Maximus, and it was fixed at Aries so late as that of Maurice; for 
it is alleged that in 598 Pope Gregory directed the archbishop of Aries 
to appoint Augustine as bishop to Britain. ^ From these circumstances 
it follows that whatever political relations can be shown to have ex- 
isted between the Basileus and the proconsuls, praetorian praefects, or 
dukes, of Gaul, at least down to the secession of the Latin See from 

' Britannia Prima, Secunda, Maxima Csesariensis, Maxima Flaviensis, Valentia and 
Vespasiana. The last is from Richard of Cirencester as quoted by Stukeley. Sir F. 
Palgrave, i, 350. Britannia Barbara made a seventh province. 

'^ Sir F. Palgra\re, I, 354-9; Guizot; Wright; Dr. Henry, 11, 193. 



254 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

the Empire, must be extended to those of Britain, as being subsidiary 
to Gaul. 

Under Augustus, Trans-Alpine Gaul, excluding the two provinces 
of Germany, vi^as divided into four provinces, Narbonensis, Aquitania, 
Lugdunensis,and Belgica. In the third century, Gaul was united with 
Germany, Spain and Britain, into one province. By the fourth cent- 
ury, the influence of feudalization had split it into twenty-seven or 
more provinces or dioceses, of which Gaul retained seventeen, Britain 
had seven, and Spain three. One proconsul, praetorian prjefect,or duke, 
ruled the whole of these dominions, and held his court at Treves. He 
held directly from the Sovereign-pontiff of Byzantium, paid him hom- 
age, and coined (silver) money in his name. Under this praetorian 
praefect was a vice-praefect to each one of the twenty-seven or more 
sub-provinces mentioned. The vice-prsefect, or governor, controlled 
the military forces, lands, treasury, posts and administration of justice. 
Originally his functions also included the regulation of public worship, 
but this was gradually taken from his hands by ecclesiastics sent from 
Rome, a policy that greatly weakened his control. The free cities, of 
which there were a few, also held direct from the Sovereign-pontiff of 
Byzantium, and (except as to ecclesiastical control when the pontiff 
became separated from the sovereign) they were not answerable to 
any other authority. After the establishment of Christianity, an officer 
called a defensor, was established in most of the towns, whose au- 
thority was independent of the governor or sub-praef ect. This further 
tended to weaken the latter's authority. Toward the end of the fourth 
century, the civil administrations of the sub-provinces began to fall, 
one after another, into provincial or barbarian hands. Toward the 
end of the fifth century, the only portion of Gaul that seems to have 
retained a Roman governor was the central portion from the Somme 
to the Loire, then, (A. D. 496,) under the command of the vice-prae- 
fect Siagrius. Belgium was governed by Salian Prankish chieftains, 
Burgundy by Ripuarian-Frankish chieftains, Aquitania by Visigothic 
chieftains, Armoricaby an administration of confederated cities, and 
Britain by half a dozen Gothic konungs. ^ 

^ It is entirely misleading to regard tiiese chieftains as Icings in the modern sense of the 
term. Knung was the Mongol name for a military chieftain of the second rank. Du 
Halde, History China. Kung in Chinese and Kahn in Afghanese have the same mean- 
ing. A chieftain, or, to use a Roman term, a centurion, commanding one hundred men, 
sometimes only fifty men, was called a king. Hampson. Orig. Patricise; Ainsworth, 
Die. , voc. Rex. " Of so little significance was the title of king compared with the ideas 
which it now suggests, that it graced the names of all kinds of petty chieftains and con- 
ferred the denomination of kingdom upon the people of territories of no greater space 



ENGLAND. A PROVINCE OF THE EMPIRE. 



255 



The feudalization of the provinces having proceeded to the point 
where it became impossible for the boroughs to communicate with the 
imperial throne, either to obtain justice, or to seek relief, it gave rise 
to that upheaval of the sub-provinces which swept away the prsetorian 
praefects and left their government in the hands of sub-praefects, gov- 
ernors, or "kings," some of whom were Italians, but the most of whom 
were provincials, aided by barbarian bondsmen, or allies. This up- 
heaval against a previous feudalism has been curiously perverted into 
a Barbarian Conquest, from which it is claimed that feudalism took its 
origin some centuries later. On this subject we have already given 
the evidence of the monuments. Except perhaps during a brief in- 
terregnum which followed the accession of a rebel governor in each 
sub-province, when success and readjustment temporarily encouraged 
the chieftains to exercise independent power, they all governed in the 
name of the Roman (Byzantine) emperor or Basileus, they paid to 
him homage and tribute, they respected his prerogatives, they stamped 
the imperial effigies upon their coins, and they compelled their sub- 
jects to obey the imperial laws. 

Clovis, after having defeated Siagrius at Soissons and after ten years 
of abortive attempts to govern a Roman province with Prankish laws, 
accepted, in 496, his diploma, his purple robe, and the ceremony of 
baptism, from the Christian emissaries of the Basileus. Theodoric, a 
barbarian, exhorted the Roman people, his subjects, to emulate the 
virtues of their (Roman) ancestors; while Athanaric the Ostrogoth 
never ventured to address the Conscript-Fathers but with respect, 
reverence and submission. * "The Goth, the Frank and the Lom- 
bard, copied the state and assumed the dignity of the former masters 
of the world," says Sir Francis. The masters whom they knew, were 
not the emperors, but the proconsuls. That the interval of provincial 

than an English park of average dimensions." Hampson, 199. When Eric Blodoxe was 
slain in Northumbria, five kings shared his fate. Hakonar Godakin's Saga, c. 4. In a 
similar way the petty Danish leaders were called kings. " There lay on the field five 
young kings with swords appeased." Battle of Brunanburgh, A. D. 938. The laird of 
a clan in the Hebrides was called a king. Hampson, 201. The barbarian " kings" were 
in fact merely chieftains. The name and office of king were unknown to them. Allen, 
on the Royal Prerogative, p. 11. " It is evident that Anglo-Saxon chieftains of minor 
power were denominated kings, and hence it may be argued that the title had no particular 
importance." Sir F. Palgrave, 11, 342. Cortes gave similar titles to the chieftains of 
petty tribes. Help's, Conquerors of America. For further remarks on Anglo-Saxon 
" kings " see the Index. The title of Kong is still employed by the sovereigns of Den- 
mark, Sweden and Norway. 

* Sir F. Palgrave, i, 360; see also Cassiodorus, Var. i, 4, 31; 11, 24, 32; iv, 6;v, 4; 
Du Bos; Montesquieu; Savigny, etc. 



256 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

independence was brief, appears from the narrative of Procopius,who 
mentions the indignation of the Basileus toward a Prankish king for 
daring to strike gold. This was Clothaire, son of Clovis,who at once 
admitted the suzerainty of the Basileus, by refraining from any fur- 
ther commission of the offence, and by striking his silver coins under 
the authority of that Sacred sovereign. Such, too, was the practice of 
all his successors, until the secession of Rome from the empire put an 
end for a time to their reverence for the Basileus. 

Rome did not sever its relations with the Eastern empire in a day, 
but by a series of events which, commencing in the seventh century, 
did not quite terminate until the thirteenth. It was Pope Gregory 
who threw down the gauntlet, by sweeping away Maurice and worship- 
ping Phocas; it was Theodorus who announced himself a sovereign- 
pontiff; Leo II. who assumed the right of investiture; and Constantine 
who first compelled the western princes to pay him homage and kiss his 
sacred feet. Finally, it was Gregory II., who seceded from the em- 
pire, and Leo III. , whose bargain with Charlemagne substantially com- 
pleted the rupture. Then it was that the homage which the western 
princes had formerly accorded to the Basileus and for a brief interval 
had rendered to the Latin See, was transferred to the German em- 
peror, to whom, or to his alternate the pope, this homage continued 
to be paid, until the Fall of Constantinople completely severed the 
relations of Rome to the Basileus and at the same time ended the sub- 
ordination of the western princes to Rome. These feudal relations it 
is now proposed to prove by four different classes of evidence: First, 
the claims of suzerainty and prerogative on the part of the Basileus; 
Second, the claims of the German emperor, or else the pope; Third, 
the vassalian acts of English princes; and Fourth, those of other west- 
ern princes. 

First. — The jealous watchfulness of the Vatican has permitted no 
documentary evidence to remain of the suzerainty claimed by the Ba- 
sileus, but it is submitted that the evidences already adduced, drawn 
from archseology , laws, customs, religion and a variety of other sources, 
are sufficiently ample, indeed that the prerogative of the gold and 
bronze coinages alone prove the case. 

Second. — If we turn to those claims of empire which were made 
either by the pope, or the German emperor, and sometimes by both, 
we shall find further corroboration of the broad view that, down to the 
Fall of Constantinople and for some time afterward, the kingdoms of 
the West were generally regarded as — and that they admitted them- 
selves to be — fiefs of the empire. In the Frankish constitution, which 



ENGLAND, A PROVINCE OF THE EMPIRE. 257 

he fondly hoped would permanently govern the empire, Charlemagne 
had provided for the collection of tithes from the western princes; 
and there can be little question that the submission to such an impost 
was tantamount to an act of homage to his empire. ^ The Peter's- 
pence remitted by Ina of Wessex was paid to and upon the demand 
of the pontificate, after the popes had renounced their allegiance to 
the Basileus and declared themselves to be the sovereigns of Christen- 
dom. The homage and tribute paid by Offa has already been com- 
mented upon. Whichever way it is viewed, it implies vassalage. After 
the Norman conquest all tithes went to Rome; a fact that implies 
homage to the pontificate. It is true that similar tithes to Rome were 
paid by English princes down to the reign of Henry VIII., but these 
were voluntary and not compulsory. The payment of such compul- 
sory tithes constitute an act of homage on the part of the English 
kings. They ceased with Edward III, 

Among other evidences of German imperial claims of dominion over 
the western provinces are the following: In 1042, Ferdinand of Cas- 
tile, proud of his Moorish conquests, took upon himself the title of 
Emperor of Spain. This was resented by the emperorHenry III., who, 
as the "successor of Honorius," claimed "indelible " supremacy over 
all the western provinces of Rome ; and who in the council of Florence 
1053, called by Pope Victor II., complained of Ferdinand's presump- 
tion. Messengers were accordingly sent to Spain to demand obedience 
and homage to the empire. The matter being submitted to Ferdi- 
nand's council, (called the Cortes,) and to the Castillian generalissimo 
the Cid Campeador, it was resolved to resist the claims of the em- 
peror Henry, and ten thousand men, besides a detachment of "trib- 
utary Moors," were placed in the field and marched to Toulouse, there 
to await the pope's decision in the matter. After some altercation, 
Ferdinand yielded his pretensions to independent power, and the pope 
received a solatium for settling the dispute. " Here was a claim of 
temporal empire on the part of Henry, dating from the Roman em- 
perorHonorius, and extending over all the western provinces, inclu- 
ding not only Spain, but also Gaul and Britain, a claim that so far as 
it affected the independence of Spain, was settled in favour of the Ger- 
man emperor. 

In A. D. 1000 Stephen, duke of Hungary, adopted the Roman Cath- 

* Bryce, 67, says these tithes were payable to the Latin pontificate, but this is incom- 
prehensible, when and so long as the pontificate was subject to the empire, that is, during 
the reign of Charlemagne and at some other periods. 

^ Callcott's Spain, i, 280. 



258 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

olic religion and received from the pope the title of king, paying the 
latter homage. His successor, Peter the German, 1036-41, paid hom- 
age and tribute to the emperor Conrad II., the Salic. ' In 992 Bores- 
las I., of Poland paid homage to the emperor Otho III., and received 
from him the title of king. In 1082 the pontificate degraded the king- 
dom of Poland to the rank of a dukedom and continued this degra- 
dation for more than two hundred years. ® In 1 181 the emperor, Fred- 
erick I., banished Henry the Lion of Brunswick to England, where 
he remained at the court of Heary II. for nine years, and until after 
Frederick's death. The implication of suzerainty on the part of Fred- 
erick and of vassalage on the part of Henry of Brunswick, contained in 
this transaction, depends of course upon whether the authority exer- 
cised by the former was submitted to as lawful, or from military ne- 
cessity. When it is proved that Henry II. was avowedly a vassal of 
the empire, the like political relation of Henry of Brunswick almost 
follows as a matter of course. The opposite view that Henry the 
Lion, (who was the brother-in-law of Richard, afterwards King Rich- 
ard I.,) voluntarily submitted to remain a prisoner with one of the 
emperor's vassals, is hardly tenable. 

In 1 192 the emperor Henry VI. ordered Leopold I., duke of Austria, 
as a vassal of the empire, to detain as a prisoner Richard I., of Eng- 
land, who had been shipwrecked at the head of the Adriatic gulf. This 
act has been variously imputed to revenge on the part of Leopold, 
to the emperor's desire of ransom, to jealousy on the part of Philip 
II., to envy on the part of John Lackland, and to a variety of other 
reasons suited to patriotic and popular tastes. However this may be, 
it cannot be disputed that Richard formally acknowledged himself a 
vassal of the Medieval empire, and that after his release and the death 
of Henry VI. he voted as a prince of such empire at the election of 
the emperor, Frederick 11, 

In 1213-16 Pope Innocent III., treating the kings of Aragon as his 
vassals forbade them to further lower their coins, a command to which 
they submitted by a declaration included in their coronation oath. ' 
However, when Gregory X., at the Council of Lyons, 1274, refused 
to acknowledge Don Jayme as king of Aragon, unless he would pay 
tribute to the Latin See, Jayme replied that it would be an unworthy 
act for him to pay tribute for a kingdom which he and his ancestors 
had wrested from the infidel Moors. " 

In 1237 the emperor Frederick II., by special messengers and im- 

' Voltaire, 11, 192. ^ Anderson's History Com., i, 121. 

' Bodin, contra Malestroict, MS. trans., p. 134. '" Calcott's Spain, i, 456. 



ENGLAND, A PROVINCE OF THE EMPIRE. 259 

perial letters summoned "all the great princes of the World to assem- 
ble on the day of St. John Baptist's nativity at Vaucouvers, * * * 
there to discuss some difficult matters concerning the empire." " King 
Henry III. of England responded to this invitation by sending an em- 
bassy of lords and prelates headed by his brother Richard, earl of 
Cornwall He intended to include the bishop of Winchester, but the 
latter successfully excused himself by alleging the impolicy of send- 
ing one of whom "the king had lately made complaint before the em- 
peror." The claim of sovereignty here set up by Frederick is clearly 
allowed by Henry, both in preparing the embassy and admitting the 
validity of the bishop's excuse. In 1241 the emperor wrote to King 
Henry that God had "decreed that the Machine of the World is to 
be governed not alone by the priesthood, but by sovereignty and priest- 
hood together." *" In 1241 the emperor wrote to the king of England 
and the other princes of the Roman empire, attributing the Tartar 
Invasion to the dissensions of Christendom created by the pope; he 
entreated them to sustain "the victorious eagles of the puissant Euro- 
pean empire " and exhorted " Germany (Almaine), Dacia, Italy, Bur- 
gundy, France, Spain, England, Apulia, Ireland, Scotland, Norway, 
the Islands of the Sea, and every noble and renowned country lying 
under the Royal Star of the West," to rally to the defence of the em- 
pire. '^ In 1 25 7 both Richard, duke of Cornwall, and Alonzo the Wise, 
king of Castile, were elected emperor. This "may be construed to 
imply that the Spanish kings were members of the empire, " says Bryce, 
186; but he seems unwilling to apply the same rule to the English 
princes. In 1344 during the reign of Edward III., the pope, Clement 
VI., created Louis of Spain prince of the Fortunate Islands. The 
English legate at the papal court supposing that by this term was 
meant the British Islands, immediately informed the king of the dan- 
ger that awaited him. " The belief that the pope had the right to make 
such an appointment proves that the king of England was not yet free 
from the suspicion of his being still a vassal of the empire. 

In 1347 Edward III., king of England, was actually elected emperor 
against Charles I. , king of Bohemia, but was prevented from accepting 
the now empty office, owing to the objections of his parliament, where- 
upon the king of Bohemia ascended the Medieval imperial throne and 
occupied it until 1378.'° 

So late as the sixteenth century,John,king of Denmark and Sweden, 

subdued a revolt in the last named country, degraded its principal men, 

" M. Paris, I, 53. '^ M. Paris, I, 355. " M. Paris, I, 347. 

'* Seven Ages of England, p. 109. '* Bryce, 223, 225. 



26o THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

seized their estates, caused these acts to be confirmed by a subservient 
" Senate, " and then solicited the approval of the emperor Maximillian. 
The latter wrote in 1505 to the states of Sweden "that they should 
obey, otherwise he would proceed against them according to the laws 
of the empire." '" 

Third. — We now come to the direct evidences of homage paid by 
English princes to the emperor. M. Guizot has shown that at the be- 
ginning of the fifth century the western empire was governed, in the 
name of theBasileus, by a prsetorian praef ect, whose court was atTreves, 
and whose authority was exercised through some twenty or thirty-odd 
sub-prsefects — either consuls or presidents — each of whom governed a 
sub-province and in turn exercised his authority through a great num- 
ber of other officers. But he has omitted to show in the same connec- 
tion that in the course of a few years the whole of this fine system 
tumbled to pieces and had to be reconstructed upon the basis of more 
Direct Government, the sub-provinces being now in the hands of pro- 
vincial, or "barbarian," princes and paying their Rome-scat or tribute 
direct to the Basileus. Such, in fact, was the position of affairs at the 
beginning of the sixth century, a position that enabled Justinian to 
declare, with some justice, that the provinces were "restored once 
more to the dominion of Rome, our Empire, after so long an interval, " 
and that furnished him his warrant for assuming, among others, the 
proud titles of "Alamannicus,Gothicus,Franciscus, Germanicus, Ant- 
icus, Alanicus, Vandalicus and Africanus. " But an hierarchy cannot 
long continue to rule directly, and in the course of another century 
this colonial system broke down, and then followed another interval 
of anarchy, during which the western provinces neither paid taxes nor 
derived from the imperial government those advantages of law-courts, 
police and administrative control, which they had been wont to receive 
in return. It was during this interval that Rome seceded from the Bas- 
ileus and laid the foundation of the Medieval empire. One of the first 
measures of the secession was the re-imposition of those taxes which 
formerly had been remitted to Constantinople. The secession took 
place in 726 ; the imposition of Peter's pence began in England during 
the year following. There cannot be the least doubt that the imposi- 
tion and payment of this tax amounted to an exertion of sovereignty on 
the one part and an admission of vassalage, on the other. It was in lieu 
of the taxes or tribute which had previously been paid to the Basileus ; 
it was not requested as a favor, but demanded as a right; failure or 
neglect to pay it was invariably punished by such means as the pope 
'^ Puffendorf; also Voltaire, Gen. Hist., in, 183. 



ENGLAND, A PROVINCE OF THE EMPIRE. 261 

had at the time the power to exercise; and alacrity in discharging it 
was rewarded in a corresponding manner. Thus, Ina of Wessex, who 
commenced to pay Peter's pence in 727, was at once appointed a Pat- 
rician of Rome, the acceptance of which title, as well as the payment 
of the tax, proclaiming him a vassal of the Western empire. 

But although the pope's assumption of imperial authority and his 
treasury drafts on the western feudatories were honoured by the Chris- 
tian, they were repudiated by the pagan, princes. Ina and Alfred " ac- 
knowledged the suzerainty of the pope and paid his tribute-drafts, but 
Offa (at first) and Desiderius (always) repudiated both. It was pre- 
cisely this refusal of the pagan princes that rendered necessary the 
military arm of Pepin. Had the western world been entirely Christian, 
neither Pepin nor Charlemagne would probably ever have been heard 
of; there would have been no obstacle to the ambition of the Latin 
pope, and he might have conducted his campaign against the rule of 
Constantinople single-handed. Hence between the pope's abortive 
secession in 642 and his practical secession in 7 26 — or rather the crown- 
ing of Pepin in 754 — the acts of homage offered to Rome were confined 
to the Christian princes, whilst between the crowning of Pepin and the 
death of Charlemagne, similar marks of homage were one after an- 
other yielded by all the princes within reach or under the influence of 
those conquerors. Afterwards, except when the two heads of the im- 
perial eagle edified the feudatories by picking at one another, feudal 
subordination to Rome became so general, both by Christian and pa- 
gan princes, that the chroniclers of the times seldom deemed it neces- 
sary to mention them. However, a sufficient number of instances has 
been recorded, to place the fact and the custom beyond dispute. 

During the reign of Charlemagne homage was paid to the empire by 
Eardwulf and other kings of Northumbria, by the kings of Kent, 
who applied to the emperor for aid against Offa. Like homage was paid 
by the Scottish kings.'* There are modern patriots who have tried to 
destroy the significance of these acts by attacking them when sepa- 
rated from the main body of evidence on the subject ; but none as yet 
have had the courage to face them in column. Among the pagans who 
held out longest against submission to the Medieval empire, was Offa 
of Mercia, the most powerful of the various chieftains who at that pe- 
riod ruled the provinces or " kingdoms " of Britain. The aid afforded 

" It will be remembered that the epithet of Great was always reserved for those princes 
who were most useful or beneficial to the church, t".^., Alexander, Quintus Fabius Con- 
stantine, Theodosius, Charlemagne, Alfred, etc. In fact " Great" is nearly always an 
ecclesiastical title. '^Eginhard; Palgrave, i, 484; Freeman, i 40. 



262 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

or threatened to be afforded against him, by Charlemagne, to the hos- 
tile kings, north and south of his frontiers, appears to have decided 
him, and he seems to have sent in his allegiance before the year 790. 
Three years previously, the second council of Nicsea had approved the 
adoration of images. Without waiting to call a council on the subject, 
this form of idolatry was at once disapproved by Charlemagne, and 
notice of his displeasure, together with the reasons therefor, was sent 
out to all the princes of the west, among others to Offa.'" This would 
hardly have been done unless Offa had previously acknowledged his 
vassalage to Charlemagne. In 790 Offa sent Alcuin to Charlemagne 
charged with the renewal of his homage and vows of fealty; and such 
was Charlemagne's gratification at this further mark of submission 
that he retained the messenger in his imperial service and loaded him 
with benefits. In 792 Ethelbert, king of East Anglia, was killed at the 
court of Offa, and the crime being, fixed upon the latter by the clergy, 
they made so much of it as to excite the nobles and induce Offa to re- 
pair to the court of Rome. While there (793) he made, or it is claimed 
that he made, the following concessions : to pay homage to the pope, 
to enforce the payment of tithes throughout his kingdom, to support 
an ecclesiastical establishment, to pay Rome-scat or Peter's-pence an- 
nually, and to pay 365 mancusses down.''" In return for these conces- 
sions Offa was elevated to the dignity of Roman patrician. Assuming 
this account to be true, Offa must have soon repented of his bargain, 
for in the following year, after the Council of Frankfort had issued its 
condemnation of image-worship, he struck those heretical mancusses 
or dinars which are described at length in another part of this work. 
If Offa ever transferred his allegiance to Rome, as is alleged by the 
church, he must have retransferred it to Charlemagne, when he re- 
turned to England. '^^ Offa's ordinances have all been destroyed." 

During the ninth century Egbert of Wessex paid homage to Charle- 
magne. His son Ethelwolf was brought up as a priest and paid his 
homage to the pope. Upon his return from Rome, being then a wid- 
ower, he was induced to marry Judith (daughter of Charles the Bald 
of France), a devotee of the church. Alfred, (the Great,) the son of 
Ethelwolf by his first wife, was anointed by the pope of Rome when 

" Timpson's Ecclesiastical History. 

^'^ Longperiergivesa full accouut of this transaction. Timpson's " Ecclesiastical His- 
tory," p. iio.says 365 marks, but this is evidently a blunder. The dinars, or mancusses, 
struck by Offa constituted substantially the only gold coinage of England during a period 
of four hundred years. 

" On this subject consult John of Wallingford, p. 529; Freeman, i, 40, 625; and 
Collier, Ecc. History, i, 142. ^'^ Palgrave, 47. 



ENGLAND, A PROVINCE OF THE EMPIRE. 263 

he was but five years of age, and, under the care of his pious mother- 
in-law and ghostly uncle (St. Noet), was carefully trained in that de- 
votion to the pontificate which he had been taught to vow in his child- 
hood. For this he was afterwards rewarded with an heroic history 
and a glorious title. Some further details touching the vassal condi- 
tion of these princes are mentioned in another place." Ethelredl.,king 
of Kent, granted to the pope (when the latter had wrested the em- 
pire from the weak hands of Charlemagne's sons) one-tenth of his 
lands, measured by metes and bounds — free from the Three Necessi- 
ties. These were taxes on the land; the bridge and fort taxes; and 
military service. This act may be fairly regarded as one of homage 
to the pontificate. ^* At the council of Gratanlea assembled by Athel- 
stan king of Wessex in 928, the first canon provides for the payment 
of tithes, both of cattle and corn, and in one of the copies, (the second 
canon,) provision is made for the payment of Peter's-pence. " In 938 
Athelstan married his daughter, or sister Eadgith, to Otto I. This 
was the emperor who was crowned at Aix-la-Chapelle in 936 and at 
Rome in 962, after he had subdued one pope and set up another of 
his own making. Over this pope (Leo VIII.,) he claimed and exer- 
cised the rights of a suzerain. These circumstances afford corrobora- 
tion, were any needed, concerning the relation of vassal and suzerain 
which it is claimed existed between Athelstan and Otto; for unless 
such feudal relations existed and were intended to be acknowledged 
by the English prince, he would hardly have compromised his position 
with the pontificate by consenting to a matrimonial alliance with the 
eiT>peror, the nature of which at that period was so susceptible of 
being misconstrued. ^^ 

The constitutions of Odo issued in the name of the pope, by Odo, 
archbishop of Canterbury, during the reign of Edmund I,, (A. D. 943,) 
contain the following language: " I command the king, the princes 
and all in authority to obey." ^'' In the second canon of the council 
of London assembled in 944 by Edmund I., all persons were com- 
manded to pay tithes and Peter's-pence to the pope. ^^ Canute king 
of England, together with numerous other western princes, assisted 
at the Roman coronation of the emperor Conrad II., an act which in 
the medieval ages was taken to imply an admission of vassalage. Says 

^^ Consult also Asserius, vita Alfredo; Henry, 11, 55-66; Bryce, 70; Timpson, 117. 
** Palgrave, 15S. -^ Spelman, Concil., torn, i, pp. 401-2. 

^® Not only Otto I., but also Henry V., and Frederick II. ^married Englisli princesses. 
"Spelman, Concil., i, 416; Willvin, Concil., i, 212. 
*^ Henry, History of Britain, 11, i, 265. 



264 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

Wippo (c. 16) of this transaction : " His ita peractis in duorum regum 
prsesentia Rudolfi regis Burgundi£e et Cunatonis regis. Anglorum di- 
vine officio finito imperator duorum regum medius ad cubiculem suum 
honorifice ductus est." Mr. Bryce, to whom we are indebted for this 
quotation, regards Canute's assistance at this function to be a mere 
act of courtesy, an opinion which is not confirmed by the use which 
that author makes of similar "courtesies" from the countries other 
than his own, for example, Denmark, Burgundy and Poland. (Holy 
Roman Empire, p. 186.) 

Edward Confessor was a Saxon by name, a Norman by education 
and a Roman by adoption; an unnatural son, an impotent husband, 
and an heirless king; a monk and a confessed vassal of the pope, to 
whom he owed his elevation. He was placed upon a throne which he 
neither merited, inherited, nor won, and there he sat whilst the true 
heir was exiled in foreign lands where he was continually menaced by 
treachery and poison. Upon the death of Edward Confessor the Eng- 
lish crown, contrary to the wishes of Rome, was seized by Harold II., 
son of Earl Godwin. Within the same year (1066) Harold was de- 
posed by Alexander II., one of the Hildebrandine popes, and his 
kingdom given to William of Normandy, who, armed with a papal war- 
rant, was enabled tocollecta sufficiently large following both in France 
and England, to defeat and supplant his rival. The pope blessed the 
banner under which William was to conduct his conquest of England 
and excommunicated in advance all who might oppose this design. 
Under these pontifical directions the English bishops met together 
and decided to deliver up the kindom to the pope's protege. Accom- 
panied by the nobles and the magistrates and dignitaries in London, 
the prelates advanced beyond the walls of that city to Berkhamstead, 
and there offered the crown of England to William. " The latter ap- 
peared to be so confident of the efficacy of his pontifical warrant, that 
after formally accepting the crown from these persons, he took no 
measures to secure the kingdom, but spent his time in hunting and 
hawking in Hertfordshire.^" 

The bearing of these facts is not altered because a few years later 
(1075) William refused to Gregory VII. the homage and Peter's-pence 
which he had gratefully paid to Alexander II. Gregory not only de- 
manded the homage and tribute, but also the arrears of the latter, 
which he asserted were due from previous years, and he couched the 
demand in terms whose haughtiness afforded to the wily Norman pre- 

'^^ Henry, Hist. Br., Ill, i, 7; Voltaire, i, 165. 
^^ Henry, in, i, 8, from M. Pictavin, 205. 



ENGLAND, A PROVINCE OF THE EMPIRE. 265 

cisely that pretext for rebellion which seems to have secretly formed 
a portion of his original design. " 

In 1114 Henry I., king of England, married his daughter Matilda to 
the emperor Henry V. , an act that, taken in connection with the other 
relations of these princes, may fairly be regarded to imply the vassal- 
age of the former and suzerainty of the latter. The feudal subordina- 
tion of Henry II. is evinced by the submissive letter which he wrote 
to pope Alexander III. , after the death of Becket ; by suffering himself 
to be deprived of his royal title and accepting it again at the hands of 
the pope's agent; by submitting to be stripped, scourged and person- 
ally degraded by the pope's agents; by holding the pope's stirrup 
(1161); and by numerous other degrading acts. Cardinal Platina, in 
referring to these transactions, always alluded to Henry as a " vassal" 
of the pope, his lord.^^ 

Stephen, king of England, in a royal charter published soon after his 
coronation, expressly acknowledged vassalage to the pope; and this 
vassalage he confirmed by permitting appeals from the courts of law 
in civil cases to be submitted to the decision of ecclesiastics. " Richard 
I., king of England, paid homage and acknowledged vassalage to the 
emperor Henry VI. ^^ This same Richard wrote to the emperor : ' 'Con- 
silio matris suae imperatori sicut universorum domino/^ Henry is said 

^' In 1080 Gregory wrote to William, "Bethink thee whether I must not very diligently 
provide for thy salvation, and whether, for thine own safety, thou oughtest not without 
delay to obey me, so that thou mayest possess the land of the living." Bryce, 160, from 
Migne, cxLViii, p. 568. In the second sentence of his excommunication which the same 
pope passed upon the emperor Henry IV., he claimed the right to "give and to take 
away empires, kingdoms, princedoms, marquisates, duchies, countships and the posses- 
sions of all men." Bryce, 161. Consult also Henry, Hist. Br., 111,1,276; Epist.Wilhelm, 
opera Lanfranc, p. 304. 

^^ Bartolommeo Plata or Platina, 1421-81, member of the papal college of "Abbrevia- 
tors " and of the Roman (antiquarian) Academy of Pomponio Leto, the illustrious mem- 
bers of which were imprisoned and tortured by Paul 1 1 . ,upon a suspicion of mutiny and 
non-conformity, in the preparation or publication of classical books and antiquities. A 
recent archosological discovery amply confirms the justice of the holy father's suspicions 
and proves that Platina and his colleagues had discovered the then dangerous secret of 
the church's history. Lanciani, p. 12. Fathers Pelligrini and Hardouin afterwards made 
similar discoveries. 

33 William of Malmesbury, p. 102, col. i; Viner's statutes. At the outset of his reign 
the emperor Conrad III. wrote to the Basileus John I., " Nobis submittuntur Francia 
et Hispania, Angliaet Dania." "France, Spain, England and Denmark have submitted 
to us." Letters in Otto Frey, i; Bryce, i86«. England at this period was governed by 
Stephen. If he " submitted " to Conrad and the ecclesiastical accounts are also true,then 
he was doubly a vassal. 

3^* Freeman i, 131. ^5 Lg(.j.gj. in Hovenden; Bryce, 186. 



266 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED, 

at his death to have released Richard from his submission.'^ But if so, 
such release could only have extended to his person ; for the latter voted 
as a prince of the empire at the electionofthe emperor Frederick II. 
John, king of England, having seized the possessions of the English 
church to pay the expenses of a war in France, was, in 1209, excom- 
municated and outlawed by pope Innocent III., who in 12 13 deposed 
him from his kingdom and conferred the same on Philip II., of France. 
Upon this, John offered to acknowledge the pope as his temporal lord 
and suzerain, to do public homage to him, and to pay him tribute. His 
penance having been accepted, and the homage duly performed to 
Pandolfo,the pope's legate, the latter ordered Philip to desist from his 
enterprise, an order which the latter obeyed, though with marked re- 
luctance. The following is the oath of vassalage taken by king John, 
and, after him, by the sixteen barons of England, at Dover, May 15, 
1 2 1 3 : "I, John, by the grace of God, king of England and lord of Ire- 
land, for the expiation of my sins and out of my pure free will and with 
the advice of my barons, give unto the Church of Rome, to pope In- 
nocent and to his successors, the kingdoms of England and Ireland, 
with all their rights, and will hold them as a vassal of the pope. I will 
be faithful to God, to the Roman church, to the pope my lord, and to 
his successors lawfully elected. I bind myself to pay him a tribute of a 
thousand marks of silver yearly, that is, seven hundred for the king- 
dom of England, and three hundred for Ireland." The first year's 
tribute was thereupon paid to Pandolfo, who affected to show con- 
tempt of it, by placing his feet upon it. The crown and sceptre were 
also handed to him. These he kept for five days, when he restored 
them to the king, by the favour of their common master." Before the 
death of John, which was wrought bypoisonin 1216, Philip, atthepeti- 
tion of the English barons and the king of Scotland, privately sent his 
son (afterwards Louis VIII.) to execute the pope's original decree. 
This prince landed at Sandwich in 12 16, overran the whole of Kent, 

^^Bryce, 187, 

*' Voltaire, General History, i, 238. Freeman (i, 131) says that John only "com- 
mended " his kingdom to the pope. After reading this text of the oath, the reader can 
judge for himself. Sir N. H. Nicolas, in his " Chronology," p. 309, admits that none 
of the Anglo-Norman kings, fromWilliam I. ,to Richard I., styled himself in his charters 
king of his doviinions, but only king, duke, or count of \i\s people; adding that John 
was the first to style himself sovereign of England. What he omits to say is that John 
thus styled himself in an oath of vassalage to the pope, his temporal lord and suzerain, 
in which oath he expressly proclaimed himself a vassal. As for the great seals of Henry 
II., and Richard I., there is nothing to show when or by whom they were made. There 
was but one seal, whilst there were many charters, and the latter, therefore, furnish far 
the better evidence. 



ENGLAND, A PROVINCE OF THE EMPIRE. 267 

advanced to London and was there crowned king of England in May, 
12 1 7. "Louis, the eldest and legitimate heir of the French king, was 
elected Lord and, as it were, King of England. " '* The date of this event, 
in some modern histories, is placed a year too late, possibly with the 
object of shortening Louis' occupation of England, which in fact lasted 
about eighteen months. ' 'A great part of the nobles and many of the 
principal cities swore fealty to Louis of France. " " Upon the death of 
John and through the exertions of earl Pembroke, the Protector of 
Henry III., Louis was defeated in September of the same year and 
compelled to evacuate the country, never to return. 

The evidences of England's subordination to the Medieval, or, as it 
was then called, the Holy Roman, empire, during the reign of Henry 
III. , are numerous, not because their political relations underwent any 
material change, but because the obscurity of the period is elucidated 
by the valuable chronicle of the monk Matthew Paris, who was often 
employed about the court, knew many of its secrets, and was not afraid 
to record them. In 1240 king Henry III. admitted in a letter to his 
son-in-law, the emperor Frederick, that " he was a tributary or vassal 
of the pope. " ^° And when Frederick reproached the king with permit- 
ting the pope " to boast that he has the power of a liege lord over you," 
Henry replied that "he did not dare to oppose the pope. " " On the first 
day (Christmas) of the year 1241 the king at Westminster seated the 
pope's legate in his own (Henry's) royal seat at table, himself sitting at 
the legate's right hand."^ In 1246, at a royal council held in London, 
the king (Henry III.) addressed to the earls,barons, abbots, and priors, 
then present, a speech in which the grievous tyrannies, oppressions, and 
exactions of the pontificate, as they were termed, were alluded to at 
length. It was thereupon unanimously resolved that the spiritual lords 
should petition the pope to abate his " insupportable yoke." A similar 
petition was addressed to his holiness by the temporal lords, clergy, 
and people in general. A petition to the same effect was also addressed 
to the pope by the king, and still another one setting forth that the 
knights' service and military service and horses and arms demanded of 
England by the Roman See, was an unendurable burden." "These 
mournful complaints of the king of England and the whole community 
were treated by the pope with contempt, " and Henry, again succumb- 
ing to the authority of the pope, " all the endeavors of the nobles, as 
well as of the bishops, were of no avail, and all hope of the freedom of 

^^ M. Paris, 11, 406. ^^ Allen, Royal Prerog., p. 46. 

^"M. Paris, I, 257. " M. Paris, i, 268. 

^*M. Paris, i, 318. ^^ M. Paris, 11, 148, 153, 155, 156. 



268 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

the kingdom and of the English church, died away. " " In 1 248 the pope 
in a conference with the French king at Lyons alluded to ' ' the king of 
England, as our vassal. " " It is admitted that by itself the pope's asser- 
tion concerning a relation of this kind would possess no historical val- 
idity, but it is abundantly evident not only from what is here shown, 
but also from the further testimony adduced elsewhere in this work, 
relating to other vassalian acts of Henry III., that this prince was a 
vassal of the empire. As to whether the pope or the emperor, or both 
combined, was Henry's lawful suzerain, is a matter which has been 
discussed already, but concerning which an additional testimony may 
with propriety be inserted in this place. Among the early ' ' statutes " 
of the English princes, (the earliest of all being the Magna Charta 
ratified in 1225 by " the Lord Henry, sometime king of England," and 
confirmed by Edward I. in 1299,) is "The Award made between the 
king and his Commons at Kenilworth,"in 1266 (51 Henry III.). This 
settlement, which relates to lands, escheats, etc., begins in the name 
of theTrinity and of Mary, ' 'the glorious and most excellent Mother of 
God," and then goes on to recite that "We, William, Bishop of Oxon," 
and others "appointed to provide for the good estate of the land," 
according to the form confirmed by the king and "by the assent of 
the legate of the Apostolic See and the noble H. of Almaine, having 
like power and authority," etc. As this was during the Great Inter- 
regnum, the ' 'noble H. of Almaine, " can only mean the Hohenstaufen, 
who in that year assumed the rights of his grandfather, the emperor 
Frederick II. If this conjecture proves to be well founded, it follows 
that Henry confirmed a Settlement which had been made by the united 
authority of pope and emperor,and whether it is, or not, well founded, 
it is certain that he permitted the papal legate to fix its terms and figure 
in the award as a dispenser of ' ' power and authority. " In other words, 
it is not the edict of a sovereign, but of a feudal prince, who is strug- 
gling to become one. This document appears in French, with an Eng- 
lish official translation, from which last named version the quoted 
words are taken verbatim." 

In 1198, to the petitions of the king Richard of England for relief 
against certain exactions, the pope answered that he would grant them 
as far as possible. In the same year the pope exhorted the king to re- 
voke some of his acts and obey the ' ' mandate " of the Apostolic See. 
In 1201-2, "Otto, emperor-elect of the Romans, "wrote to the pope, 
remindmg him that "the king of England was bound to give help to 

*'*M. Paris, 11, 170, 176. ^^ M. Paris, 11, 26S. 

^^ Statutes at Large, first volume. 



ENGLAND, A PROVINCE OF THE EMPIRE. 269 

the emperor against all enemies, and to make peace with France, as he 
himself was bound by the order of the pope, whom he thanks, next to 
God, for his promotion." In 1202 the pope issued his "mandate" to 
the king John of England to restore certain property which had been 
confiscated by that prince. In 1203 the king of France was forbidden 
by the pope to make vvar on the king of England. In the same year the 
king John was censured by the pope for his delay in appearingbefore 
his liege lord, king Philip of France."' No mention of these and other 
like evidences of the vassalage of the kings of England to the Roman 
emperor and pope appear in the popular histories of that country, yet 
that they are valid no one can doubt; and that they prove the con- 
tinuance of Caesar's empire and the vassalic condition of England down 
to the fourteenth century, only the obstinate will refuse to admit. How- 
ever, the vassalage of the kings of England was fast drawing to an end. 
The Twelve Tables were destroyed, the Books of the Sibyls were 
closed; the inspired character of the yEneid was lost; and the empire 
of Csesar was fading from sight. At the outset of Edward Third's reign 
but a flicker of it is discernible; a few years more and it was to dis- 
appear entirely. 

In the Magna Charta confirmed by Edward I. , he is styled ' 'Edward, 
bythe grace of God, kingof England, lord of Ireland anddukeof Guyan" 
(Guienne). Chapter xxvi of this instrument forbids the granting to, 
or acceptance by, any religious house, of lands, either to hold, as a 
tenant, or in any other way, under penalty of forfeiting such lands 
to the lord of the fee. Both the title assumed and the nature of this 
enactment imply an assertion of independent sovereign authority. 
But assertion is one thing,and fact another, and the fact will presently 
appear."* In 1337 Edward was appointed, and he accepted the appoint- 
ment, of vicar-general and lieutenant to the emperor, Louis IV., from 
whom he obtained authority to coin "gold and silver. " "'^ These acts 
imply vassalage to the emperor, which indeed Edward further ac- 
knowledged by performing homage, all except kissing the emperor's 
feet, a portion of the ceremony which he respectfully desired should 
be omitted. ^'' The homage which Edward had paid to the emperor was 
likewise demanded by the pope, and in the contest between the rival 

*^ Bliss, Papal Registers. 

*^ It ought to be remembered that all the earlier Statutes bear an appearance of having 
been "restored." Thus, the original MS. of Magna Charta is lost; the statute of Marl- 
borough, a code of Procedure in twenty-nine chapters, is taken from the Cotton MS., etc. 
The earliest of these texts which do not present an anachronical appearance are the two 
ordinances of the king relating to the organization of the royal exchequer, both bearin ; 
the date 1266. "'^Grafton; Froissart; Ruding, 11, 146. '" Bryce, iS'j.n. 



270 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

suzerains, for an acknowledgement of supremacy which by this time 
belonged to neither of them, it was forever lost to both." In 1207 
Haco IV. , the natural son of Swerro,an "adventurer" who had reigned 
as king of Norway from 1 186 to 1202, was proclaimed king, but did not 
become so legally until 1 247, when he acknowledged himself a vassal 
of the pope (Innocent I. ,) and paid him a tribute of 15,000 marks, be- 
sides 500 marks from the churches of Norway; whereupon the pope 
declared him to have been lawfully begotten. In 125 1 Mandog,dukeof 
Lithuania, acknowledged himself a vassal of pope Innocent IV. , and paid 
tribute ; whereupon he was raised by the pope to the dignity of king. " 

In maintaining, as he does, that the Scottish chieftains paid homage 
to and acknowledged the suzerainty of Edward I. , SirFrancis Palgrave 
silences the objections which Scottish historians have offered to this 
view, with reasons which admirably serve to refute his own denial that 
the English kings, in turn, acknowledged the suzerainty of the Med- 
ieval empire. Sir Francis's first objection is that such homage was only 
the courtesy which clothed a voluntary league of friendship. Refuta- 
tion by himself: "It is an old artifice of State, even amongst rude na- 
tions, to disguise any onerous or disagreeable condition, by civil and 
courtly terms. " Sir Francis's second objection is that the instances are 
few. Refutation by himself: " Our history exists only in fragments; 
the notice of . . , affairs is incidental; and the distance interposed be- 
tween the emperor (or pope) and his vassal, will fully account for the 
frequent absence of the king. The emperor (or pope,) might be reason- 
ably solicited to excuse the non-appearance of a monarch, who on his 
return was in danger of finding his throne occupied by an intruder." 
SirFrancis's third objection is that homage was often exacted by force. 
This objection is tersely disposed of by himself \r\ another part of his 
book, where he says that "There was no other way to exact homage."" 

Fourth. — The feudal subordination of England to the empire, which 
these evidences attest, is corroborated by the feudal subordination of 
the other western provinces ; for if it can be shown that France, Spain, 
Denmark, Saxony, Almaine, Poland, Bohemia, and other provinces 
of the West, acknowledged the supremacy of the Medieval empire, 
this fact would go far to prove that it was also acknowledged by the 
princes of England. In 754 Pepin the Short, at that time a subordi- 
nate prince, accepted the title of Roman patrician from Pope Stephen 
II., at St. Denis. He afterwards accepted from the same authority 

^' Henry, Hist. Br., iv, ii, 66. If to anybody, it belonged to the Basileus and expired 
with his downfall. 

*2 Voltaire, i. 257. " Sir F. Palgrave, i, 604-5. 



ENGLAND, A PROVINCE OF THE EMPIRE. 271 

the title of king. Tiiis is undoubtedly an act of vassalage. Alfonso II. , 
the king of Galicia, Leon, and Asturias, not only declared himself the 
vassal of the emperor Charlemagne, but he appeared to be proud of 
it, for he commanded " that he should be spoken of as Carl's man." " 
In 841 Charles the Bald, and Louis the Pious, kings of France, ac- 
knowledged themselves vassals of their brother Lothaire the emperor. 
In 875 Charles did homage to the pope, from whom he bought an 
empty title to the empire. " In 895, Odo, king of the West Franks, 
"commended himself" (essentially equivalent to an avowal of vas- 
salage) to Arnulf. This was a year before the latter became empe- 
ror. ^* In 962, Otto I., was crowned emperor at Rome, and on this 
occasion, the king of Denmark and dukes of Poland and Bohemia, 
acknowledged themselves his tributary vassals. " Three years later 
Otto celebrated his accession to the empire at Cologne. The ceremony 
was attended by the king of France and numerous feudal princes and 
dukes, whose presence testified their feudal subordination to the Med- 
ieval empire. 

In defending the pretensions of Ferdinand of Castile,(A. D. 1053,) 
the Spanish jurists set up the claim that as Spain had been lost by the 
empire to the Moors, it was a sort of derelict recovered by the Cas- 
tilian Goths and therefore belonged to them, free of homage to the 
empire. ^® To this it was replied that in fact not the Castilians, but 
all Christendom, had combined to rescue Spain from the Moors, and 
that consequently more than any other of the provinces of Rome, did 
it belong to the empire. This opinion, like all opinions which favoured 
the interests of the deathless college that reigned at Rome, eventu- 
ally prevailed. 

From these various evidences, derived in many instances from the 
reluctant testimony of unwilling historians, ^^ it seems sufficiently evi- 
dent that, from the date of the acceptance of the Christian religion 
by the various Anglo-Saxon chieftains of England, dowato the reign 
of Edward III., that country was a fief of the Roman empire, and 
that its sovereigns acknowledged this vassalian relation by doing 
homage, paying tribute, and furnishing military and other aid to the 
emperor, or else the pope of Rome, whichever happened to be upper- 

** Eginhard, Vita Caroli. ^^ Voltaire, i, 90. 

5« Freeman, i, 131. "'Gibbon, v, 149. 

** Arthur Duck, De usa et authoritati Juris Civilis. Bryce, 186, «. 

69 < • Freeman, however radical in politics, was a staunch high-churchman, and like his 
predecessor at Oxford, bishop Stubbs, thoroughly at one with all the ecclesiastical tradi- 
tions of the university." London Daily Chronicle, April 15, 1892. 



272 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

C most at the time, and by taking part in, or voting at, the diets or 
councils of the empire. To these evidences we have added in other 
parts of this work, the evidence of their abstension from the exercise 
of regalian rights, such as dealing with foreign nations, entering into 
foreign wars or alliances, sending or receiving foreign embassies, main- 
taining a standing or paid army or a fleet, coining gold, altering the 
monetary system of Rome, interfering with the language or the laws 
of the empire, or with the administration of the latter, changing the 
imperial religion, creating sub-kings or dukes, erecting corporations, 
or trading in any other ships than those sailing under the flag or au- 
thority of the empire. When massed together it must be conceded that 
these evidences present a strong presumptive case in favour of the 
views advanced in this work. *" 

®° Proofs of abstention from the formation of standing or paid armies or fleets, and 
from trading in Arabian or other foreign ships, have not been deemed necessary.the facts 
being sufficiently well known. 



273 



CHAPTER XV. 

THE SACERDOTAL CHARACTER OF GOLD. 

Coinage, the surest mark of sovereignty — Abstention of the Christian princes from 
mining and coining gold, from Pepin to Frederick II. — Dates of the earliest Christian 
coinages of gold in the West — Inadequate reasons hitherto given to explain this sin- 
gular circumstance — Opinions of Camden — Ruding — Father Jobert — The true reason 
given by Procopius — The coinage of gold was a Sacred Myth and a prerogative of the 
Roman emperor — Its origin and history — Brahminical Code — The Myth during the 
Roman republic — During the civil wars — Conquest of Egypt by Julius Ccesar — Seizure 
of the Oriental trade — The Sacred Myth embodied in the Julian Constitution — Popu- 
larity and longevity of the Myth — It was transmitted by the pagan to the Christian 
church of Rome and adopted by the latter — Its importance in throwing light upon the 
relations of the western kingdoms to the Roman empire. 

THE right to coin money has always been and still remains the 
surest mark and announcement of sovereignty. A curious proof 
of this afforded by the story told by Edward Thomas in his " Pathan 
Kings of Delhi " of that Persian commander, who, being suspected of 
a treasonable design toward his sovereign, diverted suspicion from him- 
self to the king's son, by coining and circulating pieces of money, with 
the latter's superscription.' Says Mr. Thomas: Some, perhaps many, 
of the Mahometan coinages of India constituted merely "a sort of 
numismatic proclamation or assertion and declaration of conquest and 
supremacy. " In ancient times such conquest and supremacy often em- 
braced the triumph of an alien religion. Where printing was uncom- 
mon and the newspaper unknown, a new gold or silver coinage was the 
most effective means of proclaiming the accession of a new ruler or the 
sera of a new religion." At the period of the earliest voyages of the 
Portuguese to India, the same significance was attached to the pre- 
rogative of coinage. Says Duarte Barbosa: " There are many other 
lords in Malabar who wish to call themselves kings, but they are not 
so, because they are not able to coin money. . . . The king of Cochin 

» Del Mar's " History of Money," p. Sg. 

' Gibbon declared that, were all other records destroyed, the travels of the emperor 
Hadrian could be shown from his coins alone and that the emperor Theodoric, the 
Goth, stamped his coins with the view to instruct posterity. " Hist, of Money," 8g«. 



274 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

could not coin money, nor roof his house with tiles, under pain of losing 
his fief (to the king of Calicut, his suzerain) ; but since the Portuguese 
went there, he has been released from this, so that now he lords it ab- 
solutely and coins money." Father Du Halde, in his history of China, 
makes a similar statement in reference to that country. Says he: 
" There were formerly twenty-two several places where money was 
fabricated, at which time there were princes so powerful that they 
were not contented with the rank of duke, but assumed the dignity 
of sovereigns; yet they never durst attempt to fabricate money; for, 
however weak the emperor's authority was, the coins have always 
had the stamp that he commanded." ^ Says Mr. Stanley Lane-Poole: 
"The Greek cities of the coast were not allowed (by the Persian 
monarchs) to issue gold coins ; but the Persian rulers did not interfere 
with their autonomous issues of silver and copper moneys, which bear 
types appropriate to the striking cities." * 

In his posthumous "Memoirs," Napoleon Buonaparte said of the 
Mamelukes: "In 1767 Ali Bey, Sheikh-el-Bilad, (chief of the country,) 
declared himself independent, (of Turkey,) issued coin and took pos- 
session of Mecca." ^ 

The prestige of the Padishah, or Grand Mogul, in India was so great 
that it long outlasted the fall of his power. In 1813 theTamburetty, 
or princess, of Travancore, a Hindu state never subject to the Mogul, 
applied to him for a robe of investiture for her infant son. Though 
compelled by the British authorities to desist from her purpose, she 
was by no means satisfied that the coveted investiture was unnecessary. 
In order to render it quite plain to the Hindus that the House of Babu 
had no longer any sovereign authority, the British government deemed 
it necessary to issue orders forbidding the Padishah fo coin jtioney, or 
establish weights and measures, or confer title or command except 
within the limit of his own household.* 

" The position taken by our State Department during the Brazilian 
Insurrection, was that as a precedent to recognition the insurgents 
must have a seat of government; must issue money; and must have a 
navy. At least two of these requisites are lacking in the case of the 
present insurrection" (in Cuba).' 

From these various passages it is evident that the right to issue 
money is a certain mark and necessary prerogative of sovereign power. 

^ Duarte Barbosa, pp, 103 and 157. Du Halde, Hist. China, 11, 293. 

* Poole, "Coins and Medals, 1892, p. 142. * Cosmopolitan Magazine, January, 1899. 

* Thornton's Gazeteer of India, art. " Delhi." 
'Washington semi-official dispatch, February 29, 1896. 



THE SACERDOTAL CHARACTER OF GOLD. 275 

It may be added as a correlative principle that to delegate the pre- 
rogative to Others (for example to banks, or still worse to private 
individuals,) is a proceeding fraught with dangerous consequences. 
The custom of employing coins as a means of promulgating religious 
doctrine and official information was adopted by the Romans during 
the Commonwealth. It maybe traced, at a later period, in the other- 
wise superfluous coinages of the empire. Julius, Hadrian and Theodoric 
depicted the principal events of their reigns upon their coins. In the 
absence of felted paper and printing ink, it was the only means the 
ancients had of printing and disseminating the most important intel- 
ligence and opinions. Addison correctly regarded the Roman coinage 
as a sort of ' ' State gazette, " in which all the great events of the em- 
pire were periodically published. It had this advantage over any other 
kind of monument: it could not be successfully mutilated, forged, or 
suppressed. Especially is the fabrication and issuance of full legal- 
tender coins the mark of sovereignty. Toward the end of the Republic 
and during the empire this attribute belonged alone to gold coins; 
therefore to speak of these, is to speak of full legal-tender money. 
Even during the Republic, the client states and the provinces were 
forbidden to coin gold. ® Vassal princes, nobles and prelates, under the 
warrant of their suzerains, everywhere struck coins of silver, which, 
although legal-tender in their own dominions, were not so elsewhere, 
unless by special warrant from theBasileus ; but no Christian vassal ever 
struck gold without intending to proclaim his own independent sover- 
eignty and without being prepared to defy the suzerainty of the Caesars. 
Lenormant,in his great work on the moneys of antiquity, holds simi- 
lar language. "With the exception of the Sassanian coinages, down 
to the reign of Sapor III., it is certain that the coinage of gold, no 
matter where, was always intended as a mark of defiance to the pre- 
tensions of suzerainty by the Roman empire ; for example, during the 
period of the republic, about B. C. 86, the gold coinages of Mith- 
ridates in the various places over which he had extended his conquests. 
The supremacy of Rome was so widely accepted both east and west 
that, for many centuries, neither the provinces subject directly nor in- 
directly to the Basileus, nor even the more or less independent states 
adjacent to the empire, ever attempted to coin gold money. When 
gold was struck by such states, it was as a local money of the Roman 
sovereign." ^ As such it yielded him seigniorage; it bore his stamp; its 
use implied and acknowledged his suzerainty, both spiritual and tem- 
poral ; while its issuance was subject to such regulations as he choosed 
^ Mommsen, Hist. Rome, ed. Dickson, in, 435, 584. ' Lenormant, 11, 427. 



276 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

to impose. Commodus refused to believe that his favourite, Perennis, 
aspired to the empire until he was shown some pieces of provincial 
money upon which appeared the effigy of his faithless minister. '" Then 
he executed him. Elagabalus condemned Valerius Paetus to death for 
striking some bijou pieces of gold for his mistress, upon which he 
had imprudently caused his own image to be stamped." The very first 
act of a Roman sovereign after his accession, election, or proclama- 
tion by the legions, was to strike coins, that act being deemed the surest 
mark of sovereignty. Vespasian, when proclaimed by the legions in 
Asia, hastened to strike gold and silver coins at Antioch. '" Antoninus 
Diadumenus, the son of Macrinus, was no sooner nominated by the 
legions as the associate of his father in the empire, than the latter 
hastened to strike money at Antioch in his son's name, in order to 
definitely proclaim his accession to the purple." When Septimius Sev- 
erus accepted Albinus, his rival, for his associate on the imperial throne, 
he coined money at Rome in the name of Albinus as evidence to the 
latter of his agreement and good faith." Vopiscus,in hislife of Firmus, 
asserts that the latter was no brigand, but a lawful sovereign, in whose 
name money had been coined. Pollion says that when Trebellius was 
elected emperor by the inhabitants of Isaurus he immediately hast- 
ened to strike money as the sign of his accession to power. *^ When 
the partisans of Procopius, the rival of Valens, sought to win Illyria 
to their master's cause, they exhibited the gold aureii which bore his 
name and effigy as evidence that he was the rightful head of the Roman 
empire.'* Moses of Khorene informs us that "when a new king of 
Persia ascended the throne, all the money in the royal treasury was 
recoined with his effigy." Even when counter-marks were stamped 
upon the Roman coins, care was taken never to deface the effigy of 
the sacred emperor.'* The interchange of religious antipathy and de- 
fiance which Abd-el-Melik and Justinian stamped upon their coins is 
related elsewhere. Indeed history is full of such instances. The coin- 
age of money, and especially of gold, was always the prerogative of 
supreme authority.'* The jealous monopoly of the gold coinage by 
the sovereign-pontiff, ascends to the Achimenides of Persia, that is to 
say, to Cyrus and Darius.^" In fact it ascends to the Brahmins of India. 
The Greek and Roman republics broke it down ; Caesar set it up again. 
Some remains of the peculiar sanctity attached to the coinage of 

'» Herodian, I, 9. " Dion. Cass., Lxx, ix, 4. ''^ Tact., Hist., Ii, 82. 

" Lapridinus, in Diadumenus, 2. '* Herodian, 11, 15. '^ Thirty Tyrants, xxv 
'* Ammianus Mercellinus, xxvi, 7. ''' Lavoix, MS., p. 12. 

'» Lenormant, 11, 389; iii, 389. '^ Lavoix, MS., p. 16. ^^ Lenormant, 11, 19 5-6. 



THE SACERDOTAL CHARACTER OF GOLD. 277 

gold exist at the present, or at least existed wlien Dr. Ruding wrote 
his "Annals of the Coinage*" In the ancient temples which were 
employed as mints, the officers of the mint who, of course, were priests, 
v/ere exempt from all civic duties. This exemption remained after 
the coinage fell into the hands of civil magistrates. Besides this, the 
precincts of the imperial mint where gold was coined, were sacred; 
and this character also remained until a late date and perhaps still 
remains. These privileges of the mint descended from the sovereign- 
pontiff of the Roman empire to the various princes who fell heirs to 
that empire when it was broken up in 1204. There is no knowledge 
of such privileges in the various provinces (now independent king- 
doms) before that event; they make their appearance immediately 
afterward. Workmen were " pressed " for the service of the Mint by 
Henry III., and by Edward III. " Pressing workmen for the Mint 
continued down to the reign of Elizabeth. Among the privileges of 
officers of the Mint were exemption from execution for debt, from 
military duty and from jury service. This appears in statute ist Eliz- 
abeth (20th February, 1558). It was repeatedly confirmed, so late as 
1744 and is still in force. ^^ The boundaries of the Scotch Mint pro- 
tected insolvent debtors from capture and this was probably the 
case in England from the Plantagenet period down to that of the 
Restoration. " 

Assuming the common belief that the Christian princes of medieval 
Europe were in all respects independent sovereigns before the de- 
struction of the Roman empire by the Fall of Constantinople in 1 204, 
it is difficult to explain the circumstance that none of them ever struck 
a gold coin before that event, and that all of them struck gold coins 
immediately afterwards. There was no abstention from gold coinage 
by either the Goths, the Celts, the Greeks, or the Romans of the 
Commonwealth; there was no abstention from gold coinage by the 
Merovingian Franks, or the Arabians of later ages; there was no lack 
of gold mines or of gold river-washings in any of the provinces or 
countries of the West; there was no want of knowledge concerning 
the manner of raising, smelting, or stamping gold; yet we find the 
strange fact that wherever the authority of the Roman sovereign-pont- 
iff was established, there and then, the coinage, nay sometimes even 

" Patent of 31st Henry III., m. 3; Pat. 25th Ed. III., p. 2, m. 13, dors. 

"" Ruding, I, 47. See also statute 14 Eliz., Harl. MS., Br.Mu. Lib., No. 698; also 
Report Select Com. House of Commons, 1837; Chambers Encyc, art. "Numismat- 
ics;" Penny Encyc, art. "Mint," ed. 1S39. 

-"'Encyc. Perthensis, or Univers. Die. F.dinb., 1816, xv, 98, art. "Mint." 



278 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

the production, of gold, at once stopped. It must be borne in mind 
that it is not the use of gold coins to which reference is made, but 
the coinage, minting and stamping, of gold. In England, gold coins, 
except during the early days of the Heptarchy, have been in use from 
the remotest asra to the present time. Such coins were either Gothic, 
(including Saxon,) Celtic, Frankish, or Moslem, but never Roman, 
unless struck by or under the sovereign-pontiff. In a word, for more 
than thirteen centuries — that is, from Augustus to Alexis IV., — the 
gold coins of the Empire, east and west, were struck exclusively by 
the Basileus, Again, from the eighth to the thirteenth century, a pe- 
riod of five hundred years, we have no evidences of any native Christ- 
ian gold coinage, under any of the kings of Britain. With the exception 
of an unique and dubious coin now in the Paris collection which bears 
the effigy of Louis le Debonnaire the same is true of France, Germany, 
Italy, indeed of all the provinces of the empire, whose princes were 
Christians. 

Before pointing out the significance of these circumstances it will 
be useful to clear the ground by examining the explanations of others. 
Camden conjectures that "ignorance" was the cause, but as Dr. 
Ruding very justly remarks, it could not have been ignorance of re- 
fining or coining gold, because silver, a much more difficult metal to 
treat, and one that in its natural state is nearly always combined with 
gold, had been refined and coined in Britain for many ages. " Dr. 
Ruding and Lord Liverpool both have supposed that coins of gold 
were not wanted during the Middle ages ; but this is worse than Cam- 
den's conjecture; for it flies in the face of a palpable fact. That gold 
coins were indeed wanted is proved by the very common use of gold 
aurei, solidi, folles, or besants, throughout all this period. Not only 
this, but the Arabian gold dinar or mancus was current in the coun- 
tires of the North and either this coin or the gold maravedi was the 
principal medium of exchange in the trade of the Baltic. Another 
explanation which has been advanced is that the confusion caused by 
the conquests or revolts of the barbarians, resulted in the closure of 
the gold mines, and rendered gold metal too scarce for coinage into 
money. Explanations which take no heed of the truth, made either 
in ignorance or desperation, may be multiplied indefinitely without 
serving any useful end. The facts were precisely the reverse of what 
is here assumed. It was the barbarians who opened the gold mines, 
and the Christians who closed them. The heretical Moslems, Franks, 
Avars, Saxons, Norsemen, and English, all opened gold mines during 

*^ Camden's " Remains," art. " Money," p. 241. 



THE SACERDOTAL CHARACTER OF GOLD. 279 

the medieval ages. The moment these people became Christians or 
were conquered or brought under the control of the Roman hierarchy 
their gold mines began to be abandoned and closed, " 

All such futile explanations are effectually answered by the com- 
mon use of Byzantine gold coins throughout Christendom. In England, 
for example, the exchequer rolls relating to the medieval ages, col- 
lated by Madox, prove that payments in gold besants were made every 
day and that gold coins, as compared with silver ones, were as common 
then as now. ^® If metal had been wanted for making English gold 
coins, it was to be had in sufficiency and at once. All that was necessary 
was to throw the besants into the English melting-pots. As for the 
feeble suggestion — that for five hundred years no Christian princes 
wished to coin gold so long as the Basileus was willing to coin for 
them, when the coinage of gold was the universally recognized mark 
of sovereignty and when also the profit, as we shall presently see, was 
one hundred per cent — it is scarcely worth answering. The greatest 
historians of the medieval ages, Montesquieu, Gibbon, Robertson, 
Hallam, Guizot, etc., have neither remarked these facts, nor sought 
for any explanations concerning the gold comage. In their days the 
science of numismatics had not freed itself from the toils of the soph- 
ist and forger, and it offered but little aid to historical investigations. 
It has since become their chief reliance. 

The true reason why gold money was always used, but never coined, 
by the princes of the Medieval empire, relates not to any circumstances 
connected with the production, plentifulness, scarcity, or metallurgical 
treatment, of gold, but to that Sacred constitution of pagan Rome, 
which afterwards, with modifications, became the constitution of Christ- 
ian Rome. Under this constitution and from the epoch of Augustus 
to that of Alexis, the mining and coinage of gold was a prerogative 
attached to the office of the sovereign-pontiff; and was therefore an 
article of the Roman constitution and of the Roman religion. Althouofh 
it is probable that during the Dark and Middle ages the prerogative 
of mining was violated by many who would never have dared to commit 
the more easily detected sacrilege of coinage, there are no evidences 
of such violation by Christians. 

'* History of the Precious Metals; History of Money, 

^^ Lord Liverpool does not appear to have perused this valuable and instructive work» 
Sir David Balfour, in his " Memorandum" on the Coinage, dated October 20, 1S87, 
showed that Lord Liverpool in his celebrated " Letter to the King," wherein he re- 
viewed the history of the coinage, was guilty of still further omissions. In short. Lord 
Liverpool's account of the coinage was not, as was pretended, an impartial historical 
essay, but a special pleader's brief. 



28o THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

The mines of Kremnitz, which contained both silver and gold, and 
which Agricola says were opened in A. D. 550, were in the territory 
of the pagan Avars; the gold washings of the Elbe, reopened in 719, 
were in the hands of the pagan Saxons and Merovingian Franks; so 
were the gold washings of the Rhine, Rhone, and Garonne. The gold 
mines of Africa and Spain, reopened in the eighth century, were worked 
by the heretical Moslems; the gold mines of Kaurzim, in Bohemia, 
opened in 998, were managed by pagan Czechs. Whenever and wher- 
ever Christianity was established, gold mining appears to to have been 
relinquished to the Basileus, or abandoned altogether. So long as the 
Byzantine empire lasted, neither the Medieval empire nor any of the 
princes of Christendom, except the Basileus himself, seem to have 
conducted or permitted gold-mining. 

With regard to gold coinage, the facts are simple and indisputable. 
Julius Csesar erected the coinage of gold into a sacerdotal prerogative ; 
this prerogative was attached to the sovereign and his successors; not 
as the emperors, but as the high-priests, of Rome; it was enjoyed by 
every Basileus, whether pagan or Christian, of the Joint and Eastern 
empires, from the Julian conquest of Alexandria, to the papal destruc- 
tion of Constantinople; the pieces bore the rayed effigies of the deified 
Caesars, and some of them the legend "Theos Sebastos. " When em- 
peror-worship was succeeded by Christianity, they bore the effigy of 
Jesus Christ." It would have been sacrilege, punishable by torture, 

^'William Till, p. 59, says that Justin II., A.D. 565-78, first struck the aureus (sol- 
idus, or besant,) with the eiifiigy of Christ and the legend " Dominus Noster, Jesus 
Christus, rex regnantium," and that this practice was observed down to the Fall of the 
Byzantine empire. This statement is erroneous in several respects. The first name of 
Christ on the Roman coins was never spelled " Jesus," but succesively, " Ihs," " Is- 
sus " and " lesus." The effigy of Christ did not appear on the coins of Justin II. It 
first appeared on a gold solidus of Justinian II., (Khinotmetus,) who reigned 685-95, 
and again, 704-11. Sabatier, Monnais Byzantines, 11, 22. The coin is shown in Plate 
XXXVII, No. 2. Obverse: d N. JqSTINIANVS. SERV. ChPSTI. (Our Lord Jus- 
tinian, Servant of Christ.) Full-faced bust of Justinian, showing him to be a young 
man, with a light beard and flowing locks. His coat is ornamented with squares. In 
his right hand a " potency" cross, poised on three steps; in his left, a globe, sur- 
mounted by a Greek cross; on the globe, the word PAX (peace). Reverse: d N. Ihs. 
Chs. REX. REGNAnTIVM. (Our Lord, Jesus Christ, King of Kings.) Full-faced 
bust of Christ, showing him to be a middle-aged, bearded man, with closely curled, 
almost woolly hair and close robe. On each side of the head, where the ears ought to 
be, appear two small projections, which form the extremity of a small cross, that is 
supposed to be behind the head; in his left hand, a book. Both the effigies are very- 
rude and neither of them are rayed. On a silver miliaresion of Justinian II. (Sabatier, 
No. II,) appears the effigy of Christ, showing him to be an old man, with long beard 
-and loose robe. This effigy is not rayed. The effigy of Christ did not appear on the 



THE SACERDOTAL CHARACTER OF GOLD. ^ 281 

death, and anathema, for any other prince than the sovereign-pontiff 
to strike coins of gold; it would have been sacrilege to give currency 
to any others: hence, no other Christian prince, not even the pope of 
Rome nor the sovereign of the Western or the Medieval "empire," 
attempted to coin gold while the ancient empire survived. 

Says Procopius : Every liberty was given by the Basileus Justinian I. , 
to subordinate princes to coin silver as much as they choosed, but they 
must not strike gold coins, no matter how much gold they possessed ; 
and he intimates that the distinction was neither new, nor its signi- 
ficance doubtful. Theophanes, (eighth century,) Cedrenus, (eleventh 
century,) and Zonaras, (twelfth century,) state that Justinian II. broke 
the Peace of 686 with Abd-el-Melik because the latter paid his tribute 
in pieces of gold which bore not the effigy of the Roman emperor. 
In vain the Arabian Caliph pleaded that the coins were of full weight 
and fineness, and that the Arabian merchants would not accept coins 
of the Roman type. Here are the exact words of Zonaras: "Justinian 
broke the treaty with the Arabs because the annual tribute was paid 
not in pieces with the imperial effigy, but after a new type; and it is 
not permitted to stamp gold coins with any other effigy but that of 
the emperor of Rome. "^' The "new type" complained of, probably 
had as much to do with the matter as the absence of Justinian's effigy. 
That new type was the effigy of Abd-el-Melik, with a drawn sword in 
his hand, and the Mahometan religious formula declaring the Unity of 
God — a triple offense: an insult, a defiance and a sacrilege. 

The privilege afforded to subject kings with regard to silver was ex- 
tended to both mining and coinage. Silver mining and coinage was 
conducted by all the western princes, the western emperor included. 
The pope disposed of a few coining privileges to new or weak states, or 
to dependant bishoprics; the western emperors disposed of others to 

coins of all the Roman emperors, but only on those of the following ones: Justinian 
II., Michael I, Alexander, A.D. 886-912, Romanus I., A.D. gi8, Christopher, A.D. 
gi8, Constantine X.,Nicephorus II., John Zimisces, John Comnenus, Andromicus I,, 
Michael Paleologos, Andromicus II., and his son Michael, A.D. 1295-1320. 

^^ From the period A.D. 645, when their conquests deprived the Roman empire of 
the bulk of its Asiatic and African possessions to about the beginning of the eighth 
century, the Arabians struck coins with the effigy of the Roman emperor and the em- 
blems^ and the cross. At that period they struck coins still with these emblems, but 
in place of the emperor's effigy, that of Abd-el-Melik with a drawn sword in hand. 
Like the maravedis of Henry II., 1257, and the nobles of Edward III., 1344, the issue 
of these coins amounted to an assertion of independent sovereignty, and as such was 
resented by Justinian. To the nummulary proclamation of the Arabian: " The servant 
of God, Abd-el-Melik, Emir-el-Moumenin," the Roman replied: " Our Lord Justinian, 
servant of Christ." 



282 



THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 



the commercial cities ; but for the most part silver was coined by the 
feudal princes, each for himself, and not under any continuing prerog- 
ative of the empire, whether ancient or medieval. 

The following table shows the date and place of the earliest gold 
coinages of Christian Europe: 



1225 Naples. 
1225 Leon. 



1225 
1226 
1241 



Portugal 

France. 

Faenza. 



1250 France. 



1252 
1252 

1257 
1265 
1276 
1300 



Florence. 

Genoa. 

England. 

Flanders. 

Venice. 

Boh. &Pol 



1300 Divers. 



EARLIEST GOLD COINAGES OF CHRISTIAN EUROPE, 
Weights in Etiglish Grains. 

Aurei, or augustals, of Frederick II,, struck at Amalfi; weight, 81 
to 82 grains fine. 

Ducatsof Alfonso, 54^ gr, gross; inscribed: " In the name of the 
Father, Son and Holy Ghost, God is One. He who believes and 
is baptized will be saved. This dinar was struck in Medina Tolei- 
tola, in the year 1225, month of Saphar." ^^ A curious mixture of 
doctrines and dates! 

Ducats of Sancho I., 54^ grs. gross. 

Pavilions of Louis IX.; De Saulcy, Documents, i, 115-25. 

Leather notes, stamped " 3 ducats," of Frederick II. Grimaudet, 
62; Yule's " Marco Polo." Redeemed in gold. 

Agnels.or dinars struck for Louis IX., by Blanche, his mother, 63^ 
grains gross. ^^ 

Republican zecchins, or florins, 56 grains fine. 

Republican genovinas. 

Pennies, or maravedis, of Henry III., 43 grains fine. 

Mantelets. De Saulcy, i, 31. 

Zecchins, or sequins, S^H grains fine. 

Ducats of Veneslaus, 54^ gr.gross. Rene Chopin, citing Chromerus, 
assigns the earliest gold to the archbishop of Gnesnes and bishop 
of Posnanie, under authority of King Vladislaus in 1224, but there 
■was no king Vladislaus or Ladislaus at this date. 

At about this time gold coins were also struck by the archbishop of 
Aries, the Count of Vienne and Dauphiny, the archduke Albert 
of Austria, the Count Palatine of the Rhine, the archbishop of 
Mainz, and the king of Hungary. "Coins and Medals," by 
Stanley Lane-Poole, 1892. 

Doblas (= 100 pesetas) of Alfonso XI, 

Sequins of pope John XXII., 54^^ grains fine,^' 

Ducats of Louis IV. 

Florines of Pedro IV. 

and Hainault, ducat. Guelderland, Duke Rainhold, ducat. 

Florins and ducats, struck under patent of the Emperor Louis IV., 
67X to the Lubeck mark. 

Nobles (=bs. M.) of Edward III. 

Ducats of Count William V. 

Ducats of Count Louis II., under patent Charles IV. 

Andrews of Robert II., 38 grs. fine. Henry, x, 269; Humphreys, 
"Coin Manual," 507. 

Ducats, under patent of the Emperor Charles IV. Chopin. 

Ducats, under patent of the Emperor Charles IV., 53 gr. 

Ducats of Prince of Orange, under patent of Louis 11. (XI). 
1496 Den.& Nor, Eight-mark piece of John, 240 grains gross, ^^ 

2' Although this can hardly be deemed a Christian coin I have included it in the table. 
Heiss publishes a gold coin with " Ferdinand " on one side and "In nomine Patriset 
Filii Spiritus Sanctus " on the other, which he ascribes to Ferdinand I., (II.,) 1157-88, 
but Saez is positive that they are sueldos of Ferdinand II. .(III.,) 1230-52. There is 
about the same difference of time between the Julian and Christian asras. The next 
gold coins after those of Alfonso were either the sueldos of Barba Robea, in the thir- 



I3I2 


Castile. 


I3I6 


Avignon. 


1325 


Germany. 


1336 


Aragon. 


1339 


Holland 


1342 


Lubeck. 


1344 


England. 


1356 


Holland. 


1357 


Flanders. 


I37I 


Scotland, 


I37I 


Bohemia. 


137- 


Nuremb'g. 


1473 


Holland. 



THE SACERDOTAL CHARACTER OF GOLD. 283 

That Christian Europe abstained from coining gold for five cent- 
uries, because such coinage was a prerogative of the Basileus, is an 
explanation that may not be acceptable to the old school of historians ; 
but that is not a sufficient reason for its rejection. The Old School 
would have been very greedy of knowledge if they had not left some- 
thing for the New School to discover. 

In his Science des Medailles, (i, 208-11,) Father Jobert and after 
him other numismatists, observing the strange abstention of the Christ- 
ian princes from coining gold, and perhaps anxious to supply a reason 
for it, which would have the effect to discourage any farther exami- 
nation of so dangerous a topic, invented or promulgated the ingenious 
doctrine that the Roman emperors, from the time of Augustus, were 
invested, in like manner, with the power to coin both gold and silver. 
If this doctrine enjoyed the advantage of being sound, it would de- 
prive the long abstention from gold coinage by the western princes 
of much of its significance; because assuming that the coinage of 
gold and silver stood upon the same footing and remembering that all 
the Christian princes coined silver, their omission to coin gold might 
be attributed to indifference. But that Father Jobert's doctrine is not 
sound, is easily proved. 

I. — With the accession of Julius Ceesar was enacted a new and mem- 
orable change in the monetary systems of Rome. The gold aureus 
was made the sole unlimited universal legal-tender coin of the empire; 
the silver and copper coins were limited and localized in legal-tender; 

teenth century, or the Alfonsines, struck by Alfonso XI., of Castile, 1312-50. The 
latter had a castle of three turrets on one side and a rampant lion on the other; gross 
weight 67.89 English grains. Heiss, i. 51; ill, 218. 

^^ Baron Malestroict, Ins., pp. 4-5, ascribes the first gold agnel to (Blanche of Cas- 
tile as regent of France during the minority of) Louis IX. Patin, " History of Coins," 
p. 38, repeats that they were struck by Blanche as regent, but says nothing more. As 
Blanche was regent a second time, (during the sixth crusade, 1248-52,) these coins were 
probably struck in 1250, to defray the expenses of the crusade. Louis' ransom of loo.ooo 
marks, was probably paid in silver. " There were sent to Louis in talents, in sterlings, 
and in approved money of Cologne, (not the base coins of Paris or Tours,) eleven 
waggons of money, each loaded with two iron hooped barrels." Matthew Paris, sub anno 
1250, vol. II, pp. 342, 378, 380. Humphreys, p. 532, ascribes these agnels to Philip le 
Hardi, 1270-85, but there is no reason to doubt the earlier and more explicit authority 
of Malestroict, Le Blanc, and Patin, nor the more recent judgment of Lenormant, 
("Monnaies et Medailles," p. 228), and Hoffman, (" Monnaies Royale.") 

^' This pope is responsible for a treatise on the Transmutation of Metals, the pro- 
lific exemplar of many similar works. 

^"^ The mark piece and its fractions, of King Hans, (John,) A.D. 1481-1512, are in 
the Christiania Collection. The type of these coins is evidently copied from the nobles 
of Edward III., minted 135 1 to 1360. 



284 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

the ratio of gold to silver in the coinage was suddenly and, in the face 
of greatly increased supplies of gold bullion, raised from 9 silver to 
1 2 silver for i gold ; and the mining and commerce of gold were seized, 
controlled, and strictly monopolized, by the sovereign-potiff ; whereas 
the mining of silver was thrown open to subsidiary princes and cer- 
tain privileged individuals. ^^ With the production of gold thus limited 
to pontifical control, and that of silver thrown open to numerous per- 
sons, the coinage of the two metals, in like manner, or under like con- 
ditions, was totally impracticable and historically untrue. ^* 

II. — As will presently be shown more at length, the imperial treas- 
ury, which was kept distinct from the public treasury and known by 
another name, was organized as a Sacred institution ; its chief officer, 
then or later on, was invested with a sacred title ; the coinage of gold, 
which was placed under its management, was exercised as a sacred 
prerogative; and the coins themselves were stamped with sacred em- 
blems and legends. '^ On the contrary, the coinage of silver was a 
secular prerogative, it belonged to the emperor as a secular monarch, 
and as such it was thrown open to the subsidiary princes, nobles and 
cities of the empire, while that of copper-bronze was resigned to the 
senate. These are not like conditions of coinage, but, on the contrary, 
very unlike ones. 

III. — From the accession of Julius to the Fall of Constantinople, 
the ratio of value between gold and silver, within the Roman empire, 
whether pagan or Christian, was always i to 12; whereas during the 
same interval it was i to about 6)4 in India, as well as in the Arabian 
empire in Asia, Africa and Spain, and it was i to 8 in Friesland, Scan- 
dinavia and the Baltic provinces. It is inconceivable that one single 
unvarying ratio of i to 12 should have been maintained for centuries 
by the innumerable and irreconcileable feudal provinces of the Roman 
empire, if the freedom to coin silver exercised by the feudal princes 
was, in like manner, extended to gold. 

IV. — The authority of ancient writers is conclusive on this subject. 
Cicero, Pliny, Procopius, and Zonaras, though they lived in distant 
ages, all concur in representing that the coinage of the two precious 
metals was not conducted in like manner, nor under like conditions. 
V. — The authority of modern writers, for example Letronne, Momm- 
^* The exportation of gold had been previously controlled by the senate, Cresar made 
it a prerogative of the sovereign-pontiff. 

^■^ See my " History of Monetary Systems " for further consideration of this subject. 
^' The officers of the sacred fisc who were stationed in the provinces to superintend 
the collection of gold for the sacred mint at Constantinople, are mentioned in the No- 
titia Imperii. Guizot, i, 292. 



THE SACERDOTAL CHARACER OF GOLD. 285 

sen, and Lenormant is to the same effect. This absolutely closes the 
subject and completely disposes of Father Jobert. 

The sacerdotal character conferred upon gold, or the coinage of 
gold, was not a novelty of the Julian constitution, rather was it an 
ancient myth put to new political use. Concerning the testimony of 
witnesses, the very ancient Hindu Code says: " By speaking falsely 
in a cause concerning gold, he kills the born and the unborn " — an ex- 
treme anathema. Stealing sacred gold is classed with the highest of 
crimes. ^° A similar solicitude and veneration for gold occurs else- 
where throughout these laws. The Buddhists made it unlawful to mine 
for or even to handle gold, probably because the Brahmins had used 
it as an engine of tyranny. According to Mr. Ball this superstition is 
still observed in some remote parts of India. It is possible that in 
some instances the sacerdotal character attached to gold by the Brah- 
mins belonged only to such of it as had been paid to the priests, or 
consecrated to the temples, and that when the priests paid it away it 
was no longer sacred; but the texts will not always bear this reading. 
For example, " He who steals a svarna" (suvarna, a gold coin), dies 
on a dunghill, is turned to a serpent, and " rots in hell until the dis- 
solution of the universe. " See the Brahminical inscription on copper- 
plate found at Raiwan,in Delhi. " The same superstition occurs among 
the ancient Egyptians, Persians and Jews. There are frequent allu- 
sions to it in the pages of Herodotus. For example, Targitaus, the 
first king of Scythia, a thousand years before Darius, the sacred king 
of Persia, (this would make it about B. C. 1500,) was the divine son 
of Jupiter and a daughter of the river Borysthenes, or Dneister. In 
the kingdom of Targitaus gold was found in abundance, but being 
deemed sacred, it was reserved for the use of the sacred king. In 
another place Herodotus says that in the reign of Darius, B.C. 521, 
(of whom Lenormant says, in his great work on the Moneys of An- 
tiquity, that he reserved the coinage of gold to himself absolutely) in 
the reign of Darius, Aryandes, his viceroy, in Egypt, struck a silver 
coin to resemble the gold darics of the king. Possibly, to make the 
resemblance greater, it was also gilded. For this offence Aryandes 
was condemned as a traitor and executed. '® Josephus makes many 

^^Halhed'sGentooCode,vni,99; L\,237. ^'Journal Asiatic Society,Bengal,LVi, 118. 

^* Aryandes had been appointed praef ect of Egypt by Cambyses. Darius issued a coin 
of pure gold; Aryandes struck one to resemble it, of silver. For this he was condemned 
for treason and executed. Herodotus, Mel., 166. Darius reserved absolutely to him- 
self the coinage of gold. Lenormant, i, 173. Some of the aryandics were believed to 
be still extant. Queipo, i, 554; but the coins which were taken for them are now other- 
wise assigned. 



286 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

allusions to the sacredness of gold. A similar belief is to be noticed 
among the ancient Greeks, whose coinages, except during the repub- 
lican £era, were conducted in the temples and under the supervision 
of priests. Upon these issues were stamped the symbolism and religion 
of the state; and as only the priesthood could correctly illustrate these 
mysteries of their own creation, the coinage, at least that of the more 
precious pieces, naturally became a prerogative of their order. Raw- 
linson notices that the Parthian kings, even after they threw off the 
Syro-Macedonian yoke, never ventured to strike gold coins. '' The 
reason probably was, that in place of the Syro-Macedonian yoke they 
had accepted the Roman; and that the Roman (imperial) law forbade 
the coinage of gold to subject princes. 

Whatever credit or significance be accorded or denied to these an- 
cient glimpses of the Myth, its significance becomes clearer when it 
is viewed through the accounts of the Roman historians. The Sacred 
Myth of Gold appears in Rome at the period when the history of the 
Gaulish invasion, A. U. 369, was written. The story runs that after 
the Eternal city had been saved from the barbarians, it was held by 
the Roman leaders that to the gold which had taken from the mass 
belonging to the temples, should be added the gold contributed by the 
women toward making up the ransom, or indemnity, of a thousand 
pounds' weight, and that all of it should thenceforward be regarded 
as sacred. SaysLivy: " The gold which had been rescued (from pay- 
ment) to the Gauls,as also what had been, during the hurry of the alarm, 
carried from the other temples into the recess of Jupiter's temple, was 
all together judged to be sacred, and ordered to be deposited under the 
throne of Jupiter."" 

At this period, according to Pliny, the Roman money was entirely 
of bronze. If this is true, all offerings of money to the temples must 
have been in bronze coins. If the object of conferring a sacerdotal 
character upon gold was merely to preserve the ecclesiastical treasure 
from violation, it is inexplicable that the same sacred character was 
not also conferred upon the current bronze money. It is far more con- 
sonant with the grossly superstitious character of the age to believe 
that the Romans of the period when this legend was penned were 
taught to regard all gold, except such as was worn upon the person, 
as sacred, and that the object of pronouncing the gold in the jewels 
contributed by the Roman women, to be sacred, was to prevent its ever 
being again worn as jewelry. It was this gold that saved Rome, for 
although it is said it was not actually paid to the Gauls, the delay at- 

^* Geo. Rawlinson, " Seventh Monarchy," p. 70. ^° Livy, v, 50. 



THE SACERDOTAL CHARACTER OF GOLD. 287 

tending the weighing of it, had given time for Camillus to advance to 
the rescue of the beleagured citadel, and drive the barbarians away. 
There was no less reason for rendering sacred the gold in the jewels, 
whose weighing had saved the city, than the geese whose cackling had 
contributed to the same happy event. However,it is possible that, as 
yet, a sacred character was only attached to such gold as had been 
consecrated to the gods. 

The social, servile, and civil wars of Rome were characterized by 
great disorders of the currency, and during the latter, that is to say, 
in B.C. 91, Livius Drusus, a tribune of the people, authorized the coin- 
age of silver denarii, alloyed with "one-eighth part of copper," which 
was a lowering of the long established standard. As the civil wars con- 
tinued, a portion of the silver coinage was still further debased, and 
the denarius, whose legal value had long been i6 aces, was lowered 
to 10 aces. Later on, we hear of the issue of copper denarii, plated to 
resemble those of silver. It is possibly to these debased or plated 
coins that Sallust alludes, when he says that, by a law of Valerius Flac- 
cus,the Interrex, under Sylla, (B.C. 86,) "argentum sere solutum est," 
i.e.^ silver was now paid with bronze. Valleius Paterculus explained 
the operation of this law differently, in saying that it obliged all cred- 
itors to accept in full payment only a fourth part of what was due 
them. These explanations afford a proof that at this period the gold 
coins were not sole legal-tenders. The discontent produced among 
commercial classes by this law of Valerius Flaccus, induced the Col- 
lege of Praetors, B. C. 84, to restore the silver money to its ancient 
standard, by instituting what we would now call a trial of the pix. 
Sylla, enraged at this interference with the coinage and the political 
designs connected with it, annulled the decree of the Prsetors, pro- 
scribed their leader, Marius Gratidianus, as a traitor,and handed him 
over to Catiline, by whom he was executed."' 

The exigencies of the war had evidently compelled Sylla to tem- 
porarily alter the standard of the coins — a fact which is deducible 
from the specimens still extant. Marius Graditidianus, the creature 
of an avid faction, proposed to fix the standard unalterably. It was 
in the interest of the State that Sylla destroyed him. The story is a 
brief one, but it is suggestive, 

Sylla'slex nummaria, B.C. 83, which prescribed the punishment of 
fire and water, or the mines, to the forgers of gold and silver coins, 

*' Modern writers on money have expended a good deal of false sentiment on Gratidi- 
anus. Cicero, who was his relative, and possibly knew him better, proves him a liar, 
cheat, demagogue, and traitor. Off., ni, 20, 



288 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

implies that at this period the immunity which perhaps previously and 
certainly afterwards,attended gold coins, was not yet secured. About 
B.C. 82, Q. Antonius Balbus, an urban praetor, was authorized by the 
senate, then controlled by the partisans of Marius,to collect the sacred 
treasure from the temples and turn it into coins. This money was em- 
ployed in the struggle with Sylla. It is to this period, doubtless, that 
Cicero afterwards referred when he said : "At that time the currency 
was in such a fluctuating state, that no man knew what he was worth. " " 
After Sylla's triumph over Marius and his resignation of the dictator- 
ship, B.C. 79, the ancient standard of the silver coinage was restored, 
and the opulent citizens, in order to express their approbation of this 
measure, erected full length statues of the unfortunate Marius Grat- 
idianus, in various parts of Rome. About B.C. 69, Cicero alluded to 
the public treasury as the sanctius serarium. This expression, in con- 
nection with the coins struck by Antonius Balbus from consecrated 
treasure, and the statues erected to Marius Gratidianus all point to 
this period as that of the adoption of the sacredness of gold in the 
Roman law. 

About this time the Jews appear to have again acquired some share 
in that lucrative trade with India, which they had formerly shared 
with the Greeks, and which has ever been a source of contention and 
hatred among the states of the Levant. The principal channel of this 
trade was now by the Nile and the Red Sea, and was in the hands of 
the Ptolemaic rulers of Egypt. A portion of it, however, went over- 
land by Palmyra, and from this portion Jerusalem derived important 
commercial advantages. Such as they were, these advantages were 
lost to the Jews and acquired by Rome, when, in B. C. 6;^ Pompey 
and Scaurus, snatched Judea from the contentious Maccabees, and 
established over it a Roman government. " In B.C. 59, Cicero said: 
" The senate, on several different occasions, but more strictly during 
my consulship, prohibited the exportation of gold. " Exportare aurum 
non oportere cum saepe antea senatus tum me consule gravissime ju- 
dicavit. ** Cicero was consul four years previously, that is to say, in 
B.C. 6^. " Exportation " here seems to mean transmission from one 
province of the Roman empire to another, because elsewhere in the 
same pleading Cicero says: " Flaccus, (a proconsul of Syria,) by a 

^^ The Maccabeesstruck the earliest Jewish coins. These were called sicals or shekels, 
the same name given to coins by the ancient Hindus, with whom sicca meant a mint, 
or "minted," or " cut." The Arabians of a later period also borrowed the same term. 

**Orat., pro L. Flacco, c. 28. Corroborative testimony will be found in Pothier's 
"Pandects," ed. 181S, vol. xx, p. 205, or liber 48, tit. 10, sec. 4, " LexNummaria." 
See also Cicero, Verr., i, 42. *^ Off., in, 30. 



THE SACERDOTAL CHARACTER OE GOLD. 289 

public edict, prohibited its exportation, (that of gold,) from Asia." 
The introduction of the word "Italy," in Cicero's plea for Flaccus, 
can only be regarded as a means of enlisting the prejudice of the 
judges. Here is the passage in full: " Since our gold has been an- 
nually carried out of Italy and all the Roman provinces by the Jews, 
to Jerusalem, Flaccus by a public edict, prohibited its exportation 
from Asia." 

The Jews probably bought their gold (with silver) in the provinces 
between Judea and India,because it was cheaper in those places than 
in Europe. They may have bought silver in Greece or Italy; but 
unless their commercial prominence is a trait of altogether modern 
growth, it is hard to believe that they bought gold in Italy when it 
could have been obtained nearer by, at two-thirds the price. The 
penalty which this unlucky people have paid for their ill-starred 
attempts to share in the Greek and Roman profits of the Oriental 
trade, have been more than two thousand years of hatred oppression 
and ostracism. 

The conquest of Egypt by Julius Csesar, B.C. 48, threw the whole 
of the Oriental trade into the hands of Rome. Canals connecting the 
Mediterranean and Red Seas had been constructed successively by 
Necho, *' Darius, and Ptolemy, and at the period of the Julian con- 
quest of Egypt, one of these canals was used for the voyages of the 
Indian fleet. 

A century or so later Pliny recorded the fact that a hundred million 
sesterces worth of silver, (equal in value to one million gold aureii,) 
was annually exported to India and China. The numerical proportion 
of the gold and silver ratios in Europe and India, indicate that this 
trade was not a new one, and that a similar trade had been conducted 
by the Ptolemies and by the Babylonians and Assyrians upward to the 
remotest asra of commercial intercourse between the Eastern and the 
Western worlds. " During the Ptolemaic period the ratio was 10 for i 
in Europe and 12^ for i in Egypt, whilst it was 6 to 6^ for i in the 
Orient. In other words, a ton weight of gold could be bought in India for 
about 6^ tons of silver and coined in Egypt into gold pieces worth 12)^ 

*" Herodotus, Clio, 202; Eut., 158; Mel., 39. 

** Strabo. At a later period the inter-oceanic canal became clogged with drifting sand 
and was reopened by Trajan or Kadrian, probably the latter. It was kept open by the 
Byzantine emperors. See Marcianus, in Morisotus " Orbis Maritimus," and Ander- 
son's History of Commerce. It was again opened by Amrou, in A.D. 639, during the 
reign of the caliph Omar. The Ptolemaic (and Roman) route was by Alexandria, the 
Nile, the Canal, Berenice, Sabia, and Muscat. It is fully described in the Periplus 
maris erythrsei of Arrian. 



290 



THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 



tons of silver. "' The profit was therefore cent per cent. ; and eve;i 
after the Romans conquered Egypt, the rate of profit on exchanges 
of Western silver for Eastern gold, was quite, or nearly, as great. This 
explains what seemed so abstruse a puzzle to the industrious but un- 
commercial Pliny. He could not understand why his countrymen 
' ' always demanded silver and not gold, from conquered races. " *^ One 
reason was, that the Roman nobles knew where to sell this silver at 
a usurer's profit. When this profit ceased, as it did when the Oriental 
trade was abandoned, the Roman government entirely altered its pol- 
icy. During the Middle Ages it preferred to collect its tributes in 
gold coins. 

When the enormous difference in the legal value of the precious 
metals in the Occident and the Orient, is considered, and that too at 
a period when maritime trade between these regions was not uncom- 
mon, it is impossible to resist the conviction that the superior value 
of gold in the west was created by means of legal and perhaps also 
sacerdotal ordinances. 

This method of fixing the ratio may even have originated in the 
Orient. Colebrook states that the ancient Hindus struck gold coins, 
which were multiples of the christnala, the latter containing about 
2^ English grains fine."" According to Queipo, fivechristnalas equal- 

*'' Minimaque computatione millies centena millia sestertium annis omnibus India 
et Seres peninsulaque ilia imperio nostro adimunt. Tanto nobis delicioc et feminse con- 
stant. Nat. History, xii, 18. In another place, vi, 23, he puts it at half this sum, 
" quingenties H.S." for India alone. The " feminine luxuries" imported in exchange 
included gold, silk, and spices. Numbers of the silver coins exported to India at this 
period have been found during the present century buried in Buddhist topes. In A.U. 
775 (A. D. 22), the Emperor Tiberius in his Message to the senate said: " How are 
we to deal with the peculiar articles of female vanity and especially with that rage for 
jewels and precious trinkets which drains the empire of its wealth, and exports in ex- 
change for baubles, the Money of the Commonwealth to foreign nations and even to 
the enemies of Rome?" Tacitus, Annals, iii, 53. 

^^ Equidem miror P. R. victis gentibus in tribute argentum imperitasse non aurum. 
Nat. Hist., xxxiii, 15. 

■•^ Asiatic Researches, London, 1799, v, gi.. Meninsky, in his "Thesaurus Ling., 
Orient.," p. 1897, voc. ' Choesrewani," says that in the time of Chosroes, (A. D. 
531-79,) the Persians worshipped the dirhems of that monarch. If we read "venerated" 
for "worshipped" and "dinars" and "dirhems" we shall probably get nearer to the 
truth. Chosroes, the deified, was so successful in his wars against Justinian, that the 
latter was obliged to pay him an annual tribute of forty thousand pieces of gold (sacred 
besants). These were most likely the pieces, that, upon being recoined in Persia, were 
venerated by its subservient populace. Von Strahlenberg, p. 330, says that, in the reign 
of Chosroes, the les-tiaks or Oes-tiaks, near Samarow, venerated a cufic coin of the 
Arabians, from whom they had captured it. In a tomb near the river Irtisch, between 



THE SACERDOTAL CHARACTER OF GOLD. 291 

led a masha of ii^ grains and 80 christnalasa toIa,orsuvarna,of 180 
grains. " This system appears to have originated at two different 
periods, the octonary relations belonging to the remote period of 
the Solar worship and the quinquennial, to the Brahminical period. 
Dished gold coins (scyphates,) of the type afterwards imitated in the 
besant, called ' 'ramtenkis, " and regarded as sacred money, were struck 
in India at a very remote period. The usual weights were about 1 80, 360 
and 720 English grains (i, 2 and 4 tolas). One example weighed 1485 
grains; and was probably intended for 8 tolas sicca. The gold being 
alloyed with silver, gave a pale appearance to the pieces. The ex- 
tant coins contain no legible dates or inscriptions ; and are much worn 
by repeated kissing. The emblems upon them are the sacred ones of 
Rama, Sita and Hunuman. They were evidently held in high venera- 
tion by the Brahmins. Fac-similes of these coins have been pub- 
lished. " In the Brahminical coinages the value of silver seems to 
have been lowered from 4, to 5, for i ; and though in later coinages 
the value of silver was again lowered, as before stated, to about 6}^ 
for I gold, the general tendency in the Orient was to maintain the 
value of silver and in the Occident, to raise that of gold. So that 
although the system of deriving a profit, from the device of altering 
the ratio, was probably of Oriental origin, the practical operation of 
this system, certainly at the periods embraced within the Greek and 
Roman histories, was precisely opposite in the western world, to what 
it was in the eastern. The governments of Persia, Assyria, Egypt, 
Greece and Rome made a profit on the coinage by raising the value 
of gold; while those of India, China and perhaps also Japan, made 
their profit by maintaining, in some cases enhancing, the value of sil- 
ver. In the last named state silver was valued at 8, some say at 4, to 
I of gold; at one of which ratios it stood so late as 1858. 

It is evident that by continuing the use of this myth, or by attaching 
a sacerdotal character to the coinage and coins of gold which in Italy 

the salt lake Jamischewa and the city Om-Ies-troch, a flat oval gold coin was found 
and delivered to Prince Gagarin, the governor of Siberia, (about A.D. 1715.) Its rude 
type is thus described by Von Strahlenberg (p. 408): " It seems tome designed for the 
figure of the Virgin Mary with a little Jesus in her lap, whose face is encompassed 
with a glory. I have seen the like in several Russian churches. The characters seem 
to be Boutumian Scythian." This character is shown in Rev. Thomas Hyde's "Quad- 
rupt. ling, dialecto" and David Wilkin's " Prsefat. in Orat. Domin. Joannis Cham- 
berlayn." "The Chrysandrians were thegolden 7nen who inhabited the fabulous kingdom 
of Numismatica." Noel, Die. Fable, art. " Chrysandriens." This fable is evidently 
related to the amalgam-box of Mercury alluded to in the author's work on Money. 
'"Queipo, I, 449-52. "Jour. Asiat. Soc, Bengal, Lni, 207-n. 



292 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

may hitherto haveonlybeen attached to consecrated deposits of gold, 
a character which the Conqueror who was also the pontifex-maximus 
of E-ome, was quite competent to confer upon it, he would not only 
acquire the means to republish upon its coins the mythology and re- 
ligious symbols of the empire, altered to accord with his own impious 
pretensions of divine origin, but he would also be enabled to reap 
profits equal to those which the Ptolemies had derived from the Ori- 
ental trade. Indeed, in this respect, Caesar made another innovation. 
He increased the Roman ratio from 9 to 12 for i and there it remained 
fixed in consequence of his ordinance, for thirteen centuries. " 

That Ceesar attached asacerdotal character to the gold coins of Rome, 
and that Augustus and his successors, both the pagan and Christian 
sovereign-pontiffs of the empire, continued and maintained this sacred 
character,is so abundantly evidenced, that it has never been disputed. 
It is only in assigning reasons for the measure, that numismatists have 
differed. Evelyn believed that the gold coins were rendered sacred to 
preserve them from profanation and secure them from abuse. " Others 
have found the origin of this regulation in the desire to preserve the 
most precious monuments of Roman antiquity from the melting-pot; 
and they point to the numerous coinage restorations of Trajan, as a proof 
of the Roman anxiety on this subject. The reasons herein suggested 
as the true ones are, first, the usefulnessof coins to proclain monarchical 
and pontifical accessions and to disseminate religious doctrine; and 
second, the profits of the Oriental trade, which could only be secured 
by means of an ordinance enjoying the sanctity of religious authority.. 

These reasons even receive confirmation from the contrary regula- 
tions adopted by the Arabians. Whether in scorn of the Roman myth- 
ology, or else to enhance the value of the immense silver spoil which 
they had derived from the conquest of the Roman provinces in Asia, 
Africa, and Spain, or because they were unable or unwilling to continue 
that pretence of sacredness, partly by means of which so artificially 
high a valuation of gold had been created in Europe, it appears that 
when the Arabians came to permanently regulate the affairs of the 

^^ Kenyon (R. L.) Gold Coins of England, ed. 1884, p. 14, admits that there was 
no gold coinage in England until Henry III., but assigns no reason for it. He says 
that gold besants "have been found" in England, and is of opinion that "they had 
no legal currency here and were probably accepted merely as bullion," all of which is 
pure nonsense. So long as there were five besants or solidi to the libra, the former 
were always current at 48 pence or 4 shillings, with due regard to their weight, which 
was by no means constant. This fact proves that they a'zV have "legal currency." 
Kenyon should have read Madox and the rolls of the Exchequer. 

■'^ Evelyn, " Medals," 224-7. 



THE SACERDOTAL CHARACTER OF GOLD. 293 

conquered provinces, (reform of Abd-el-Melik,) they swept away the 
mythological emblems upon the coins for all time, and for several cent- 
uries they destroyed the Roman valuation of gold. They issued plain 
coins, of constant weight and fineness, and reduced the ratio to the In- 
dian level (then) of 6}i for i. 

Whatever reasons induced Caesar to enhance the value of gold, there 
can be no doubt of the fact. In the scrupulum coinages of A. 17,437, the 
ratio was 10 of silver for i gold. In the coinage system of Sylla, A.U. 
675, the ratio was 9 for i. Caesar raised the value of his gold coins by a 
double jump to 12 for i. In other words,without changing its value in 
silver coins, he gradually lowered the aureus from 168 ^to 125 grains, 
fine ; and this alteration of weight he sanctified and rendered permanent 
by stamping the coins with themost sacred devices and solemn legends. 
If this great politician of antiquity endeared himself to the masses by 
thus lowering the measure of indebtedness, he secured for his empire 
the approval of the patrician and commercial classes by securing its 
stability, for the ratio which he adopted and solemnized was never 
changed in the Roman law, until Rome dissolved into a mere name, a 
name by which ambitious princes afterwards continued to conjure, but 
which at that late period really belonged to a dead and powerless empire. 

In that admirable review of the Byzantine empire which forms the 
subject of Gibbon's seventeenth chapter, he declares that by law the 
imperial taxes during theDark Ages were payable in gold coins alone. " 
We now know the reason of this ordinance. The Oriental trade was 
gone. The custom of the period was that when gold coins were not 
paid, silver coins were accepted instead, at the sacred weight ratio of 1 2. 
In the reign of Theodosius the officer entrusted with the gold coinage 
was the comes sacrarum largitionum,or Count of the Sacred Trust, one 
of the twenty-seven illustres, or greatest nobles of the empire. His 
powers supplanted those of the former quasstores praefecti aerarii and 
other high officers of the treasury. His jurisdiction extended over the 
mines whence gold was extracted,^* over the mints in which it was 
converted into coins, over the revenues which, being payable in gold 
coins, kept the latter in use and demand, and over the treasuries in 
which gold was deposited for the service of the Sacred emperor, or in 
exchange for silver. Even the woollen and linen manufactories and 

^■* A similar statement occurs in his Miscellaneous Works, in, 460. 

*^ In Assam the gold mines are " guarded by orders from the king and worked only 
under special authority." Sir John Bowring, 1857, quoted in Lock's voluminous work 
on " Gold." Similar monopolies of the gold mines by the governments of Bangok and 
Assam are mentioned on pp. 272, 273 and 279 of same work. The Roman custom 
was evidently borrowed from the Orient. 



294 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

the foreign trade of the empire, were originally placed under the con- 
trol of this minister, with the view, no doubt, to regulate that exchange 
of western silver for oriental gold, of which some remains existed at 
the period of these elaborate and subtle arrangements. 

It is the peculiarity of sacerdotal ordinances that they long outlive 
the purpose intended to be subserved by their enactment. In the hot 
climates of India, Egypt, Palestine, and Arabia, the interdiction of 
certain meats for food may possibly have been originally founded upon 
hygienic considerations; a fact that may have commended this or- 
dinance to local acceptation, but certainly did not earn for it that gen- 
eral and continued observance which it owes to the Brahminical, Jew- 
ish, and Mahometan religions. It is not to be wondered that Justinian I. 
rebuked Theodebert, the Frank, for striking heretical gold coins, nor 
that Justinian II. proclaimed war against Abd-el-Melik,for presuming 
to pay his tribute in other heretical gold. But it certainly seems strange 
to find this myth observed in distant ages and among distant nations 
— for example, to witness the pagan Danes of the medieval ages solemn- 
izing their oaths upon baugs of sacred gold; to find Henry III. of 
England, after plundering the Jews of London, receiving the gold into 
his own hands, but the silver by the hands of others; and to discover 
that Philip II. of Spain attempted to re-enact, in America, this played- 
out myth of idolatrous India, Egypt, and Rome. ^^ 

The importance of this myth in throwing light upon the political 
relations of the Roman provinces toward the Byzantine and Western 
or Medieval empires, does not depend either upon its antiquity or 
the reasons of its adoption into the Reman constitution, nor upon its 
general acceptance, or popularity. It is sufficient for the purpose if it 
can be shown that as a matter of fact the sovereign-pontiff alone en- 
joyed the prerogative of coining gold throughout the empire, and that 
the princes of the empire respected this prerogative. It is submitted 
that concerning this cardinal fact the evidences herein adduced are 
sufficient. What, then, was this political relation inrespect of England? 
Clearly that of a feudal province, whose reigning prince was not inde- 
pendent, but the vassal of a distant suzerain ; a feudal province, whose 
laws were not final, but subject to appellate Rome; a province or state 
of limited powers, restricted, bound, conditioned, hampered, burdened, 
and hindered, by institutions whose history had been forgotten, and 
whose origin was unknown. 

^* Procop. Bel. Got., iii, 33. Lenormant. 11, 453-4, leads us to infer that this oc- 
curred about the year 540. Du Chaillu, "Viking Age;" Matthew Paris, i, 459; " Re- 
copilacion de Leyes de los Reynos de las Indias," law of 1565, 



295 



CHAPTER XVI. 

CLUES DERIVED FROM THE jC^ S. d. SYSTEM. 

This system appears in the Theodosian Code — It is probably older — Its essential 
characteristic is valuation by moneys of account — Advantages — Previous diversity of 
coins — Danger of the loss of numismatic monuments — Exportation of silver to India 
— Difficulty of enforcing contracts in coins of a given metal — £ s. d. as an instrument 
of taxation — As an historical clue — It always followed Christianity — Side-lights to 
history afforded by the Three Denominations — £s.d. and the Feudal System — It 
saved the most previous monuments of antiquity from destruction — Artificial character 
of the system — Its earliest establishment in the provinces — In Britain — Interrupted in 
some provinces by barbarian systems — Its restoration proves the resumption of Roman 
government — This rule applied to Britain, 

SEARCHING for the beginning of a custom is like tracing a river 
back to its source. We soon discover it has not one source but 
many. When brevity is preferable to precision it is sufficient if we 
follow an institution to its principal or practical source. 

We have elsewhere shown the marks of chronological stratification 
in Roman history, originally decimal and afterwards duodecimal, which 
resulted from a change which it is assumed took place in the method 
of measuring the solar circle. This we are persuaded was originally 
divivided into ten parts, each of 36 degrees. Hence the archaic Ro- 
man or Etruscan year of ten months each of 36 days, and the week 
or nundinum of 9 days. At a later period the zodiac was divided into 
twelve parts each of 30 degrees, whence the year of twelve months 
each of 30 days. ' In these two systems we have the basis of the deci- 
mal and duodecimal methods of notation which are so strangely in- 
termingled in all Roman numbers and proportions and which also 
appear in ^ s. d. Thus the number of solidi to the libra was five, 
and the number of sicilici to the libra twenty, both of which are deci- 

' By some writers, the year of 360 days has been erroneously called a lunar year, but in 
fact a year contains nearly thirteen lunar months. The year of twelve months was ori- 
ginally solar, and was always astrological. Many of the early institutes mentioned by 
Livy, Pliny, and Censorinus were evidently taken from the laws of conquered and ob- 
literated Etruria,and falsely attributed to Romulus,Numa,and other creations of Roman 
ecclesiastical fancy. Among these institutes was the changed division of the year from 
ten months of 36 days, to twelve months of 30 days. Livy, I, 19. For numerons other 
authorities on this subject see my "Worship of Augustus Csesar." 



296 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

mal proportions. ' On the other hand, the number of denarii to the 
sicilicus was twelve and the ratio between the metals was twelve, 
which is duodecimal. ^ 

Those writers whose researches into monetary systems are bounded 
by the narrow conclusions of Adam Smith's "Wealth of Nations "or 
Tooke's "History of Prices," usually attribute the origin of;^ j. d. 
to William the Norman or to Charlemagne, and their explanation of 
the system is commonly confined to that of the j£, which they re- 
gard as the symbol for a pound weight of silver or else a pound weight 
of silver coins. The different books in which this delusion is repeated 
are probably sufficiently numerous to stock a good sized library. Yet 
it can be demolished in a few words. Neither the contents of the 
Norman nor Carlovingian, nor any other coins, sustain this theory; 
neither is it sustained by the texts of the Carlovingian or of any other 
period; the libra of money (not the whole triad of ^^ s. d.) is at least 
five hundred and may be fifteen hundred years older than Charle- 
magne, being clearly defined in the Theodosian Code, Lib., xiii, 
Tit. II, II, of which the following is the text and literal translation: 
" Ita ut pro singulis libris argenti quinos solidus inferat." "So that 
for each libra of money, five solidi are to be understood." * Thispor- 

"^ The " pound " of money (not the whole triad of £ s. d.) is to be discerned during 
the decay of Attic liberty. The Romans used the term pondus to mean 100 drachmas, 
and the Greeks used the " talenton " of money before them. Twenty drachmas (of silver) 
equalled in value one stater, and five staters were valued at a talenton, which the Romans 
called a pondus. The Greek ratio was 10. Most of the confusion on this subject has 
resulted from the refusal of numismatic writers to recognize what their own monetary 
systems of to-day attest — that every name of a weight also meant at the same time a sum 
of money, which had no relation to such weight. Humphreys, Chambers, and Putnam, 
all furnish confused references to the pondus of 100 drachmas. The Persiansin the time 
of the deified Cyrus appear to have had a system of £ s. d. very like what the Romans 
afterwards had. 

^A remarkable custom, which it may reasonably be conjectured originated in the 
changed subdivision of the zodiac, prevailed among the Goths. With them ten meant 
twelve, and an hundred was six score. The custom still prevails in Essex, Norfolk, and 
Scotland. Sir Francis Palgrave, I, 97. Some vestige of the score system still lingers in 
the French names for numbers. Curiously enough, too, the method of counting by scores 
was employed by the Aztecs. Prescott, p. 35. The vigesimal system is still used in 
Northern Asia. Consult Prof. Conant's "Number Concept." 

•'It is from this passage in the Theodosian Code that the learned Boeckh, Romede 
ITsle, and Jean Bodin regarded the libra as a weight and deduced the supposed ratio 
between silver and gold of 14.4 to i. It is needless to say that if the libra was a money 
of account and not a weight, the deduction is erroneous. There is no instance of such a 
ratio as 14.4, or thereabouts, in Roman or Greek history; a fact which by itself should 
have rendered these erudite persons more cautious. The Code of Justinian, Liber X, 
tit. Lxxvi, de argenti pretio, also gives the ratio: "pro libra argenti, 5 solidi." 



CLUES DERIVED FROM THE jT^ S. d. SYSTEM. 297 

tion of the Code is atributed by some commentators to the constitu- 
tions of Constantine, by others to a law of Honorius and Arcadius, 
A. D. 397, ^ but in fact the libra of five gold pieces is older than either. 
It was used for five gold aureii by Caligula, Probus and Diocletian. 
It frequently occurs in the texts of Valens, ® Arcadius, and other sov- 
ereign-pontiffs of the fourth to the eighth century, where, except in 
one instance,it always means five solidi. Accordingto Father Mariana, 
"De Ponderis etMensures, " the sicilicus,knownin a subsequent age 
as the gold shilling, was struck so early as the first century of our 
sera, for he states that in his own collection were gold pieces of this 
weight struck by Faustina Augusta, Vespasian and Nero. Others of 
Justinian, weighing i6 grains, are now in the Madrid collection. The 
denarius of the early empire, of which 25 in value went to the aureus, 
nearly tallied in weight with the half aureus. In the reign of Cara- 
calla 24 denarii went to the aureus; the ratio of value between the 
metals remaining unchanged at 12 for i. Such is briefly the genesis 

of ;^ s. d. 

The translation of "argentum" into "money" needs no explanation 
to Continental readers, for in all the Continental languages, French, 
Spanish, Italian, etc., "silver" means "money." This custom is de- 
rived from the Romans of the empire with whom "argentum" meant 
money, as the following examples sufiiciently prove: Argentariae 
tabernse, banker's shops: Livy. Argentaria inopia, want of money: 
Plautus. Argentarius, treasurer: Plautus. Argentei sc, nummi, or 
money: Pliny, XXXIII, 13. Ubi argenti venasauriquesequunter: Lu- 
cretius, VI, 808. Cum argentum esset expositum in sedibus: Cicero. 
Emunxi argento fenes: Terrence. Concisum argentum in titulos, 
faciesque minutas: Juvenal, xiv, 291, Tenue argentum venaeque se- 
cund^e: Ibid, ix, 31. The Romans in turn got this term from the 
ancient Greeks whose literature they studied and whose customs they 
affected. One of the Greek names for money was "argyrion " from 

^Queipo, II, 56. 

® The cupidity of the duke of Moesia induced him to withhold provisions from the 
Gothic refugees.whom Valens, the sovereign-pontiff, had permitted to enter that prov- 
ince; so that a slave (mancipium) was given by the Goths for a loaf of bread (unum 
panem) and ten libras (of money) for a carcass of meat (aut decern libras in unum carnem 
mercarentur). It is evident that 10 libras meant precisely what the law declared it should 
mean, namely, 50 solidi, (equal to the contents of about 32 English sovereigns,) for ten 
pounds' weight of gold would contain as much as 464 English sovereigns. Gibbon avoids 
the difficulty by saying " the word silver must be understood"; but such was not the 
custom of that time any more than it is now. When silver was understood it meant 
money, and not metal. Said the law: " So that for each libra (libris argenti) 5 solidi 
(of gold) are to be understood." Jornandes, De Getarum, c. xxvi; Gibbon, II, 597. 



298 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

argyros, silver. The Hebrew word for money was caseph, literally 
silver, alluding to the coined shekels of the Babylonians. The same 
custom, /. e. , using the term ' ' silver " for money is to be found in the 
most ancient writings of Egypt and India. 

In a letter of Honorius and Theodosius II. to the prsefectof Gaul 
written in our year of 418, after suggesting the formation of a coun- 
cil to regulate the affairs of that province, the emperors proposed, in 
case its members failed to attend the meetings, to subject them to 
fines of three and five " libras of gold " each. It is evident that the 
"libras" here mentioned are moneys and not weights, for five Roman 
libras weight of gold are equal to the quantity contained in 232 Eng- 
lish sovereigns of the present day, and this would have been a prepos- 
terously heavy mulct for mere non-attendance. On the other hand, 
a libra of account represented by five gold solidi would not have con- 
tained more than one-fourteenth of this quantity of gold; and it is 
evident that this was intended. 

These researches into the origin of ;^ s. d. were necessary in order 
to determine its essential characteristics as a system of valuations and 
proportions. The names of the sub-divisions of money have in all ages 
been used to denote the relative proportions of the sub-division of other 
measures, as of weight, area, capacity, etc., and it is this practice 
which is responsible for much of that confusion on the subject of 
money that distinguishes economical literature. For example,^ s. d. 
were at one time used as proportions of the pound weight for weigh- 
ing bread; at another time as proportions of the acre for measuring 
land. In the former case j[^ represented a pound weight of bread, 
s. an ounce, etc.; in the latter ;^ meant one-and-a-half acres, and 
d. a rod of land. '' Sir Francis Palgrave, i, 93, says that many in- 
stances of this practice are to be found in charters of the sixth cent- 
ury. The mischief of it lies in the insinuation it conveys that because 
a "pound" weight can be the unit, integer, or standard of weight 
and a "pound" measure, (i^ acres) can be the unit of superficial 
area, so a "pound " sum of money can be the unit of money; which 
in the last case is physically impossible. The unit of money can never 
be one "pound," but must necessarily be all the "pounds" under the 
same legal jurisdiction joined together. In other words, the unit of 
money is and must necessarily be all money. " 

Taking the essential character of ^^ s. d. to be a system of valua- 
tion by moneys of account, as distinguished from a system of valua- 

' Statute 51 Henry III., 1267; Fleetwood's " Chronicon Preciosum." 
^ See chapter on this subject in the author's " Science of Money." 



CLUES DERIVED FROM THE ^ S. d. SYSTEM. 299 

tion by coins, it must have possessed merits that rendered its adoption 
highly necessary and advantageous. We shall find that this was ac- 
tually the case. Previous to the adoption of ^^ s. d. there was com- 
monly but one denomination of money and — except in the peculiar 
monetary system of the early Roman Commonwealth — it usually re- 
lated to an actual coin. With the Romans this coin was successively 
the ace, denarius, sesterce, and aureus. Even when two of these kinds 
of coins circulated side by side, as the ace and the denarius, or the 
sesterce and aureus, sums of money were always couched in one de- 
nomination, never in both. We now say so many pounds and shillings 
and pence, perhaps combining some of each denomination in one sum, 
or we may say so many dollars and cents, or so many francs and 
centimes. Down to the aera of ^ s. d. the Romans in expressing sums 
of money only used one term. So long as only one or two or three 
kinds of coins were current at the same time, there v^-as no inconve- 
nience in this custom, but when coins came to be made of different 
sizes and weights and of several different metals — bronze, silver and 
gold — some of them of limited tender and highly overvalued, like the 
bronze coins of to-day, one term for money became inexact and incon- 
venient. This is one of the reasons that led to the adoption of ^ s. d. 

In the last quarter of the third century the Roman empire was di- 
vided between four Caesars, to whom was afterwards added he whom 
Sir Francis Palgrave has rather effusively termed " our own Carau- 
sius. " Even before this division took place the diversity of bronze 
and silver coins was so great as to produce confusion. With four em- 
perors almost daily adopting new designs for coins and several thou- 
sand unauthorized moneyers expelled from Mount C?elius and other 
places to ply their trade in every province of the Roman empire, the 
confusion became intolerable. Without some device by aid of which 
this maddening variety of types and weights could be readily harmon- 
ized and valued, it became impossible to carry on the operations of 
trade. Such a device was^^ s. d. 

The infinite diversity and number of local and imperial silver coins 
had long since broken down that fragment of the fiduciary system 
of money which was attempted to be revived by Augustus; it had 
effaced all the influence of mine-royalties; it had nullified all the ef- 
fects of mint-charges and seigniorage. The relative value of coins 
which Rome was formerly content to read in the edicts of her con- 
suls or emperors, she was now almost compelled to determine with a 
pair of scales. The imperial government could scarcely have observed 
this symptom of popular distrust without grave concern. In propor- 



300 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

tion as such coins lost fiduciary value and rested upon that of their 
metallic contents, so did the empire lose importance to the provinces, 
and the proconsuls to the local chieftains. Furthermore, when money- 
ceased to derive any portion of its value from limitation of issue, or 
from sacerdotal and imperial authority, why might not the procon- 
suls feel at liberty to issue circulating money as well as the sovereign- 
pontiff; why not the under-lords as well as the proconsuls; why not 
foreigners as well as citizens; why not anybody or everybody? 

Besides this, it is to be remembered that the coins of Rome were 
designed to illustrate its mythology and history, and that they con- 
stituted its most precious and enduring monuments. Upon them were 
stamped the story of its miraculous origii:;, the images of its gods, 
demi-gods and heroes, the symbols of its religion, the spirit of its laws, 
and the dates of its most glorious achievements. All these now threat- 
ened to disappear in the melting-pot, the monuments had come to be 
regarded only as so much bullion, and every provincial governor or 
barbarian king would be tempted to reduce them to metal in order 
that upon recoining them, his own upstart image might shine in the 
glass that had once reflected a Romulus, a Caesar, or an Augustus. 
There was but one way to stop such a calamity and that way was mo- 
nopoly of the coinage and arbitrary valuation ; but this had to be done 
through some new device, for the old ones were worn out and would 
be seen through and rejected at once. * The efforts to save the old 
monuments would justify a slight discrimination of value at the out- 
set in favor of certain precious issues and this discrimination might 
be extended and enlarged as time went on. Rome had hitherto kept 
its most sacred numismatic monuments from the furnace by means of 
a Golden Myth, a fixed ratio, and the restriction of exports. Without 
disturbing either of these arrangements it was now proposed to sup- 
plement them with the device of jQ s. d. 

The diversity of coins and the hope of restoring some of their lost 
fiduciary value, furnish reasons for the adoption of a triad of mon- 
etary terms in the place of that single term in which the Romans had 
hitherto couched their valuations and contracts; but the same con- 
siderations do not explain why these denominations were essentially 
ideal ones, nor why they remain so still. The explanation is simple 
enough. It will be found in the physical impossibility of adding to- 

' In a less superstitious age perhaps not even the device of ^^ i-. d. would have allayed 
the fear that the valuations would be changed, or have kept the coins from the melting 
pot. But to the Romans that law was a sacred one which forbade the melting down of 
old coins. Digest, i, c. de Auri pub. prosecut., Lib. 12, 13; Camden, Brit., p. 105. 



CLUES DERIVED FROM THE j[^ S. d. SYSTEM. 301 

gether quantities of various materials and producing a quotient of one 
material. If jQ means a piece of gold, s. a piece of silver, and d. a 
piece of bronze, then as a matter of fact it is impossible to add them 
together and produce a sum which shall represent a quantity of any one 
of these metals. Hence these denominations are essentially ideal. 
However, as logic seldom stands in the way of practical legislation, 
we may be sure that it was not this difficulty which compelled the Ro- 
mans when they adopted ^ s. d. to make them ideal moneys or moneys 
of account that would logically add together; it was the practical diffi- 
culty of enforcing contracts payable in coins of a particular metal. 
Numbers of the mine-slaves had revolted or escaped to swell the armies 
of the Goths and other malcontents, the produce of the Roman mines 
had become irregular, the Oriental trade had absorbed vast quanti- 
ties of silver. "* A contract to pay sesterces meant so many silver coins 
and the name sesterce had been so long wedded to a silver coin that 
it was found easier to establish a new denominatiou than divorce ses- 
terce from silver. The same maybe said of the gold aureus. ;£s. d., 
being imaginary moneys, might be represented by either gold, silver 
or bronze coins at pleasure of the government, and as best suited the 
convenience of the times or the equity of payments. " 

It is scarcely necessary to turn fromthe public to the private influ- 
ences which urged the adoption of ^ s. d. upon the imperial and 
pontifical mind. A monetary system which by insensible degrees might 
be made to slip away from all metallic anchorage or limitation needed 
no further recommendation to a needy treasury. Yet it still had an- 
other one. The diversity of races that constituted the population of 
the empire and the nascent feudal system, both stood in the way of 
any uniform system of taxation ; while the distance between Rome and 
the capital of each province greatly multiplied frauds upon the treasury 
and threw too much power and profit in the hands of the provincial 
vicars or proconsuls and the greedy farmers of the revenues. The 
facility to regulate the value of various coins which the adoption of 
j£ s. d. promised to afford, placed in the hands of the sovereign-pontiff 
the means of levying a tax that neither be evaded nor intercepted. 

Thus many reasons and interests combined to recommend the sys- 

'" Pliny, Natural History, vi, 23, and xii, 18. 

" In 1604 the Privy Council of Ireland decided that;i^j-.^. were imaginary moneys and 
meant concretely whatever coins the sovereign from time to time might decree they 
should mean; they deduced this conclusion not only from the spirit of the Common law, 
but also from the principles of the Civil law, and there can be no doubt that such was its 
legal significance at the period of its original adoption in Rome. State Trials, 11, 114; 
Digest, XVIII, II. 



302 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

tern of ^ s. d. It brought into harmony the diversity of coins and coin- 
ages ; it promised to restore some of the lost value of bronze and silver 
coins and to conserve or obliterate (at pleasure) the ancient and sacred 
types; it offered to remedy the difficulties produced by the irregular 
supplies of the mines and by the heavy exports of silver to India; it 
placed a future choice of other remedies in the hands of the emperor ; 
and finally it was competent, at a pinch, to solve the problem of sud- 
denly recouping an empty treasury. Under the system of jQs.d., any 
coin or piece of money could be legalized or decried at pleasure of the 
government, and any value could be put upon it that seemed expedient 
or desirable. All that was needed was a brief edict of the supreme sov- 
ereign and at once, with military precision, this or that piece of money 
took its allotted station among the jQ s.d., and there it served in the 
capacity and with the rank assigned to it by imperial master.*^ 

In the fourth century the d. was represented by a silver coin, and the 
s. by a gold coin, each containing about i8 (afterwards i6) grains of 
fine metal, and the ;£ by five large solidi, (afterwards calledbesants,) 
each containing 72 (afterwards 64) grains of fine gold. If we follow 
the adoption of jQ s. d. in the various provinces of Europe — for ex- 
ample, Gaul, Britain, Spain, orGermany — it will be found that it never 
preceded, whilst it invariably followed, the establishment of Roman 
Christianity. It therefore furnishes a valuable guide to the date of such 
establishment and to the restoration of Roman government. £ s. d. 
was adopted in Gaul by Clovis ; in a part of England it was established 
by Ethelbert; whilst in other parts it was rejected by the unconverted 
Gothic kings,his contemporaries. '^ So the Arian Goths of Spain, down 

'^ On different occasions the same coin has ranked as a penny, three-half-pence, two- 
pence, and even three-pence. A shilling was at one time represented by a gold coin, at 
another by a silver coin. Examples of this character often occur in the ordinances of the 
medieval kings of France, and there is reason to believe that the sovereign-pontiffs of 
Rome more than once altered the legal value of their silver and bronze issues. 

'^ The name of the sicilicus, which is evidently derived either from the fourth of the 
aureus, or else from the fifteen-grain gold pieces of Sicily, was applied to the Norse aurar, 
in the laws of Ethelbert (Sections 33-5). From the context it is evident that fifty scats 
are less in value than three shillings, hence that the purely silver scat of five to the gold 
shilling was not yet in use, and that the scats alluded to were the old rude ones of com- 
posite metal weighing 7^ grains and upwards, and of varying and uncertain metallic 
contents. The shilling of Ethelbert's laws is the earliest mention of that coin in England. 
There was as yet no Norse analogue either for the libra or the penny; in other words, 
there was no twelfth of the aurar, nor any twenty-aurar pieces, hence there was no further 
application of;^ s. d. at that time to Gothic coins. The Roman triad of "pounds, shil- 
lings, and pence " had yet to be fully established in England. Some of the gold sicilici of 
the heretical Roger II., of Sicily, bear the legend in Arabic, "One God: Mahomet is his 
prophet." On the other is the phallic sign. A specimen, somewhat worn, weighed by 
the writer, contained 15 grains gross. These shillings were evidently copied from older 
Sicilian coins of the same weight and type. 



CLUES DERIVED FROM THE j^ S. d. SYSTEM, 303 

to theclose of Roderic's reign, refused both theRoman religion and the 
Roman system of money ; and the Saxons would none of either, until 
Charlemagne bent their stubborn necks to the yoke of the Roman 
gospel. 

Another valuable historical side-light is derived from jT^s. d. The 
arithmetical relations of these moneys of account were originally, but 
have not been always, 12 X 20=240. Sometimes they were 5 X 48 = 240, 
or 4X60 = 240, or even (exceptionally) 5x60 = 300. Whenever this is 
observed it affords a sure indication of grafting. The Gothic ratio be- 
tween the precious metals was 8, the Arabian ratio 6^, and theRoman 
ratio 12. Consequently when the Roman arithmetical relations of 
^ s. d. were grafted on Gothic or Arabian or Gothico- Arabian monetary 
systems, they had to be modified to suit the local valuation of gold and 
silver. '* For example, in the eighth century, in Roman Christian Gaul, 
(ratio of 12,) it took 12 silver pence, each of 16 grains, to equalin legal 
value I gold sicilicus of similar weight, whilst in the Gothic parts of 
Britain where the Arabian ratio prevailed, (ratio of 6}^,) 5 silver pence, 
each of 20 grains, sufficed; so that if, as convenience dictated, the 
newly introduced ^ was still to consist of 240 pence, it would have to 
be valued at 48 shillings of account ; and this was accordingly done. ** 
Modifications in the weights of the silver penny and efforts to har- 
monize the two principal conflicting ratios, the Roman and the Arabian, 
will explain not only the remaining variations of ^ J-. d. above alluded 
to, but also many other obscure problems connected with the early 
monetary systems of England. 

We have seen how ;£ s. d. arose out of the circumstances of a decay- 
ing empire. We shall now see how it accommodated itself to those cir- 
cumstances, so as to promote the very disease it was in part designed 
to remedy. The empire was falling to pieces, splitting into many parts. 
First it had one Caesar, then two, three, four, or more. Even when it 
got rid of its Thirty Tyrants and reduced the number to six the diver- 
sity of coins and coinages was too bewildering for practical purposes. 
To harmonize and regulate these coins, as well as for other reasons, 
^ s. d. was adopted. Yet, by accommodating itself to a diversity of 
moneys, this system prevented the evil from righting itself through 
the simple and efficacious means of recoinage. Dispensing with the 
necessity of uniformity, it encouraged heterogeneity by rendering it 
less intolerable; and thus facilitated that splitting up and subdivision 

'* The system of Offa, king of Mercia, was Gothico-Arabian, and, as is elsewhere 
shown, some of his coins had Arabian inscriptions upon them. 
>* System of Ethelbert, king of Kent, 725-60. 



304 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED, 

of the coining authority which characterized the matured feudal sys- 
tem and lent it strength and support. Devised in part to unify moneys 
and centralize authority, it became no insignificant aid to decentral- 
ization and feudalism. On the other hand, but for its influence, the 
Roman coins, and with them the memories which they invoked and 
the sacred myths they perpetuated, would have been destroyed; and 
the modern world would have had to read the history of the past in 
the unmeaning bangs of Scandinavia, the saigas of Frakkland, or the 
composite scats of the Anglo-Saxon heptarchy. 

Returning to the historical clue afforded by the adoption of -Q s. d., 
the reader will scarcely fail to have been impressed with the extreme 
artificiality of this system. Hundreds of books have already been 
written upon it, and hundreds more will probably yet be written upon 
it, before its true character, mischievous bearing and incongruity with 
the modern age of progress, will be recognized and acted upon. 
Allusion is here made not merely to a system of three denominations, 
as jT^ s. d.^ nor to a mingled bidecimal and duodecimal notation, nor to 
its character as money of account, but to the mingling in this system of 
imperial with provincial and municipal or other coins, of seignioried 
with non-seignioried coins, of coins with various degrees of legal- 
tender, '°of coins of local with others of extensive legal-tender, of native 
with foreign coins made legal-tender, or redeemable with non-redeem- 
able coins, of governmental with private (bank) issues of various de- 
grees of legal-tender, and of non-interest-bearing with interest-bear- 
ing legal-tender issues. In these respects and others the principles of 
all the monetary systems of the present day originated in the Roman 
imperial system of £^ s. d. j and so far as they follow it, they interpose 
important obstacles to the practice of equity, the just diffusion of 
wealth, and the progress of civilization." 

The ;£ s. d. system was as much unfitted for the Gothic kingdoms, 
or fiefs, of the dark ages as it was suitable for the empire. In a former 
work it was shown that there existed a natural harmony or tendency 
toward harmony between systems of government and systems of 
money, just as there is between social phases and language. For ex- 
ample, if one of the sentences of Cicero or Tacitus were imputed to a 
savage orator, no matter how eloquent or renowned, the unfitness of 
the phraseology and its lack of harmony with the social phase of the 

'* "It is unlawful for either the money-changer or the merchant to refuse Caesar's coin; 
so that if one presents it, then whether he will or no, he must give up what is sold for 
it." Epictetus,about A.D.120. Dissertations, i,xxix. I commend this passage to those 
modern financial sciolists who contend that the ancients knew nothing of legal-tender, 

"Del Mar's "Science of Money," Chapter vi. 



CLUES DERIVED FROM THE j[^ S. d. SYSTEM. 305 

speaker, would at once expose the blunder, or imposture. Similarly, 
if an £^s. d. system of money were attributed to a tribe of Zulus, the 
incongruity of the collocation would immediately stamp it as untrue. 
For not only are three denominations of money too artificial a means 
of valuation to fall within the mental compass of a barbarian tribe,one 
of them (thc;,^) was always an ideal money,and all of them were main- 
tained, and could only be maintained, by a mint code of extreme com- 
plexity and covering mining, minting, seigniorage, artificial ratio be- 
tween the precious metals, and a hundred other subjects concerning 
which neither Zulu nor Goth ever had a clear conception. For these 
various reasons the artificial system of^^.^. furnishes an unerring clue 
to historical researches during the dark ages. In a previous chapter 
similar clues were found in the Golden Myth and the sacred Ratio of 
Twelve; in the present one we shall follow the clue of the Three 
Denominations. 

The text of the Theodosian Code implies the use of £^ s. d. at Rome 
and in all the Christian provinces of the empire. The non-Christian 
provinces were those parts of Gaul and Britain which at the time of 
the promulgation of this Code were temporarily under the control of 
Anglo-Saxon, Frankish and other barbarian chieftains. The letter of 
Honorius and Theodosius II., A. D. 418, implies the use of ;£ s. d. 
at that date in southern and perhaps central Gaul. From 496 to 561, 
during the governments of the Roman patricians Clovis and Clothaire 
I., the £^ s. d. system was probably established throughout the whole 
of Gaul except Brittany, Burgundy and Provence. The Roman coins 
found buried with the body of Childeric, " and more especially the Ro- 
man offices and titles accepted by the Merovingian Frankish princes 
down to the sixth century, when image worship was insisted upon, or 
still worse, when the assassin Phocas was worshipped at Rome, im- 
ply the continuance of Roman government in Gaul until that period. 
After this time and until the reign of Pepin many of the provinces 
forgot their allegiance. " Over and over again the Franks had pro- 
fessed and evinced their willingness to live under Roman law and Ro- 
man government and they proved their sincerity and good faith in 
these professions by accepting Roman ecclesiastics as the adminis- 
trators of that law and the representatives of that government. So 
long as Rome inculcated the worship of a Heavenly deity the Franks 

'^ His tomb was opened in the seventeenth century. Morell, 67. 

'* The Merovingians struck gold under authority of the Basileun until the reign of 
Theodebert, who struck gold for himself. Yet even after this perjod many of the Mero- 
vingians coined under authority of the Basileus. 



3o6 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

continued loyal to the empire, but when the Roman pontiff fell at 
the feet of Phocas and the detested religion of emperor- worship seemed 
about to be revived in the very fane of religion, they turned upon 
the empire. ^^ From Theodebert to Pepin the Short the Roman mon- 
etary system was interrupted in Gaul. Its place was partly filled with 
a Frankish system in which the relative value of gold and silver, no 
tonger kept in place by the Sacred myth of Rome, fell back to the old 
Druidical (and Etruscan) ratio, or else obeyed to a certain extent the 
influence of the Moslem mint-laws of Spain and southern Gaul; for 
it became i to lo instead of i to 8. The gold sou or solidus was val- 
ued in Merovingian laws at 40 silver deniers or denarii; the little sou, 
or sicilicus, was valued in the same laws at 10 silver deniers ; the sicili- 
cus and denier, containing the same weight of metal. The first fact 
is from the texts of the period, the last from the coins themselves. 
The establishment of this system was the mark of Frankish indepen- 
dence from the empire. It lasted about a century and a half; after 
that Gaul again became a Roman province. " 

In short, the monetary system of jQ s. d. was established wherever 
Roman government prevailed, in Italy, Greece, Asia Minor, Armenia, 
Egypt, Carthage, Spain, Gaul, Britain and Germany. After it was es- 
tablished in Rome it was not established by any state or people not 
subject to Rome, never by the pagan iVngles, Jutes, Saxons, Franks, 
Sclavs or Huns, and never by the Moslems, whether in Arabia, Egypt, 
Africa, Spain, France or Persia. After the dry bones of the Sacred 
empire fell into the hands of the Turks in the fifteenth century, the 
latter, in order to accommodate their nummulary language so far as 
practicable to the customs of the conquered Greek provinces, em- 
ployed the ^ and the d. to mean, not indeed what they formerly 
meant, but something that it suggested, and this practice afterwards 
found its way into other provinces of Turkey; but it had no essential 
connection with the jQ s. d. system and employed only two denomi- 
nations instead of the characteristic three. 

Although it is probable that the libra of money, (not the £^ s. d. sys- 
tem,) continued to be used in the Roman cities of Britain from the 
Roman period down to the time when these cities fell into the hands 
of the Anglo-Saxons, we have no certain evidence of the fact. The 
earliest implication of the ^ s. d. system in any document now ex- 

20 Charlemagne, at the council of Frankfort, 794, denounced the worship of the im- 
perial images. 

21 The earliest rehabilitation of the Roman system appears in the capitulary of Pepin 
and Carloman, A. D. 743, wherein the sol is valued at I2 deniers. Guizot, III, 27. 



CLUES DERIVED FROM THE jQ S. d. SYSTEM. 307 

tant, occurs in the barbarian laws of Ethelbert A.D. 561-616, (§§ 33-5,) 
where certain fines are levied in shillings. No ' ' libras " are mentioned, 
nor no denarii, for twelfths of the Norse aurar; " hence no entire 
adoption of the system can be positively inferred. The shilling of 
Ethelbert was probaby either a Latin name for a coin identical in 
weight with the Norse aurar or an anachronism inserted by copyists at 
a later date. ^' In neither case would this text afford any certain in- 
dication when the ^ s. d. system was re-introduced into Britain, and 
there is no other evidence that can be relied upon of an earlier date 
than the reign of Ina, which was toward the end of the seventh century. 
Measured by the clue of ;Q s. d. the Anglo-Saxon chieftains in- 
terrupted the continuity of Roman government in some parts of Brit- 
ain during an interval of more than two centuries, that is to say, from 
a date somewhat later than the edict of Arcadius and Honorius, to 
the reign of Ina. In other parts there was scarcely any interval at all, 
for many of the Roman cities of Britain held out long after the le- 
gions departed and even then they capitulated on terms which in- 
volved, if they did not expressly admit, the imperial supremacy of 
Rome, So far as it goes, the clue of ;Q s. d. harmonizes with the Myth 
of Gold and the Sacred ratio, and they all corroborate those other 
evidences which proclaim that, except during a comparatively brief 
interval, which was probably no greater in Britain than in Gaul, the 
former remained a province of the empire from the reign of Claudius 
down to a much later period than is commonly supposed. 



24 



^* See Roman coins of Canterbury mentioned in my "Ancient Britain," Chapter xiv. 

^^ Bishop Fleetwood, Chronicon Preciosum, pp. 52-4, gives examples from Bromp- 
ton's translations of the laws of Ethelstan and Ina, in which the terminology and valua- 
tions of money were changed to suit the circumstances of the translator's times. Guerard 
and De Vienne give examples of similar alterations in the ancient texts of the Frankish, 
Lombardian, Frisian, and Burgundian codes of law, 

** Mr. Freeman deems it probable that at the end of the sixth century there were still 
Roman towns in Britain, tributary to the English chieftains, rather than occupied by 
them. Sir Francis Palgrave i, vi, extends the Roman occupation of some British cities 
down to the seventh century. Du Bos, Savigny, and Gibbon concur in a similar belief 
with regard to some of the cities of Gaul. 



3o8 



CHAPTER XVII. 

VASSALIAN POSITION OF THE ANGLO-NORMANS. 

Marks of sovereignty wanting in the coinages of the Anglo-Norman kings — No 
national gold or bronze coins — No national coinage laws — The circulation filled with 
Roman gold and bronze coins at Roman valuations under Roman laws — The silver 
sterlings which are now paraded as the sole monuments of the period really filled but 
a small part of the circulation — Failure of attempts to prove that the European king- 
doms were independent sovereignties. 

THE false chronicles of the Middle Ages lead us to believe that 
the states of Europe during this period were independent sov- 
ereignties, but the moment we refer to the monuments we find that this 
is not true; that they were not independent, but dependent, they were 
not sovereignties, but vassals to the Roman, or as we wrongfully term 
it, the Byzantine empire. The most numerous and reliable of these 
monuments are the coins and the coinage systems. Both of these evi- 
dences are to the same effect: down to the Fall of Constantinople the 
so-called kingdoms of Europe were vassal states and so they acknowl- 
edged themselves to be, both in what they did and in what they ab- 
stained from doing. Let us take England for example, and for the 
sake of brevity, limit our researches to the period from the accession 
of William I., to the Fall of Constantinople. 

Had England been an independent state during this interval her 
coinages would have included gold, silver, and copper, or other base 
metal, struck in England or for account of the Crown, adorned with 
national devices and valued by denomination in the English law. To 
these coins might have been added a few French or other foreign 
pieces admitted into the circulation from motives of policy or cour- 
tesy but valued in the English law in English denominations. On the 
contrary, England coined neither gold nor bronze metal. Her mone- 
tary system was of a totally different character. It consisted of impe- 
rial Roman, or Byzantine, gold and bronze coins, together with Norse, 
' ' Anglo-Saxon " and Norman silver pieces. Nor had she any coinage 
laws but such as were promulgated in Constantinople or Rome, nor 
any national devices upon her scanty issues of silver coins. When 



VASSALIAN POSITION OF THE ANGLO NORMANS. 309 

this system has been briefly described it will be shown that imme- 
diately after the Fall of Constantinople all these missing marks of 
sovereignty were supplied: gold and base metal coins of native mint- 
age bearing national devices, valued in the national law and issued 
by virtue of national mint statutes and indentures. 

The authority for the statements we are about to make are the 
Domesday Book, the Liber Niger, the Rolls of the Exchequer or 
Accounts of the Treasury, as collated by Madox, and the coins them- 
selves. There can be no higher authority. 

During the Norman dynasty the coins which circulated in England 
and which were received into and paid out of the exchequer consisted 
chiefly of five classes. 

I. — Christian Gold. The gold besants issued by the Basileus at Con- 
stantinople contained about 65 English grains fine and were valued 
at 40 sterlings, this being at the imperial ratio of 1 2 silver for i gold. ' 
The besant was a thin and slightly ' 'dished" gold coin, (scyphus,) with 
the image of Jesus Christ on one side and the effigy and name of the 
Basileus on the other. It was the direct descendant of the sacred au- 
reus of Augustus and the sacred solidus of his successors, the pagan 
sovereign-pontiffs or emperors of Rome. The largest transactions 
were effected with these coins. There are extant a few gold coins of 
this period which have been assigned to the mints of English Christian 
prelates, but there is no evidence to sustain this opinion. There can 
be little doubt that the pieces are heretical. The Anglo-Norman kings 
coined no gold. The coinage of gold ceased when Christianity was 
introduced, and practically the last gold coins struck in England pre- 
vious to the reign of Henry III., were the dinars of Offa before he 
finally submitted to the yoke of the gospel. 

II. — Heretical Gold. The Moslem dinar, 60 to 66 grains fine, and 
the zecchin, 50 to 55 grains fine, were in circulation under the re- 
spective names of besant and mancus. Five of the zecchins went to 
the mark which was valued at 160 sterlings each of 18 to 20 grains of 

' At the same time the ratio in the Gothic or Scandinavian coinages was 8 for i and 
in the Moslem coinages 6)4 for i; so that a 12 for i ratio was a sure mark of Roman 
coinage and valuation. See entry in the exchequer-rolls, 17th John, 1215, where cer- 
tain besants (of Constantinople) were valued each at 35-. 6d. silver. Madox, 11, 261. 
Making allowance for difference of standard between the gold and silver coins and for 
the probably abraded condition of the former, this evidently means a ratio of 12 for i. 
At the same time the ratio for bullion was 9 or 10 for i. We are not here alluding to 
the compromise ratios in the coinages of the Gothic kings of the Heptarchy, shown 
in our History of Monetary Systems, but to the actual ratios for bullion in 5 Stephen, 
2 and 16 Henry II., and 15 John. Madox, I, 277; li, 261W. 



310 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

fine silver; a ratio of 9 or 10 for i. In other words, heretical gold 
was valued lower than sacred gold, or gold of the Byzantine stamp. 
Such an exceptional valuation could not have been maintained had 
there been any lawful means to coin gold in England. There was also 
in circulation a Moslem gold half-mithcal which was valued at a pro- 
portionate rate in silver sterlings. Finally, there was a Gothic or 
Norse ora which is valued in Domesday Book at 20 sterlings, (or one- 
eighth of the mark,) and which, at 10 for i, (the silver value of heretical 
gold,) must have contained about 38 grains fine. All of these heretical 
coins, especially the mancus and zecchin, or sequin, were in common 
circulation and, except the ora, they are frequently mentioned in 
the texts of the period, or else included in their multiple, the mark.^ 
III. — Christian Silver, The silver penny, or sterling, was the coin 
employed in the smaller transactions of the period ; yet although such 
coins were struck by the Anglo-Norman kings and are now almost the 
only coins of the period which are to be found in numismatic cabinets, 
it must not be supposed that they formed an important part of the cir- 
culation or that there were no other coins which went by the same 
name; for the contrary is the fact. The Roman silver denarii, struck 
by the sovereign-pontiff of Rome and stamped PERMJSSV DIVI 
AVGVSTI,and afterwards with the names and devices of the Byzan- 
tine emperors, circulated as pennies; so also did the half-dirhems of 
the heretical Moslems; indeed coins were so scarce that in all prob- 
ability any silver coin, containing 18 to 20 grains fine, went for a penny 
or more. The Anglo-Norman pennies contained about 20 grains of 
silver 0.925 fine, equal to about 18^ grains fine. There is reason to 
believe that they sometimes went for i J^, 2, and even 3 pence each. 
(History Monetary Systems, ch. viii.) 

IV. — Heretical Silver. Beside the Moslem half-dirhems, there also 
circulated in England the Gothic or "Anglo-Saxon " silver scats, of 
which four went to the Anglo-Saxon shilling of account while sixty 
shillings went to the pound of account. There were therefore two 
moneys of account employed during the reign of at least the earlier 
Anglo-Norman kings, namely, the Roman 12X20=240 pence, and 
the Gothic 4 X 60=240 pence to the ' ' pound " of account. However, 
they were employed in different classes of payments. 

'^ The origin of the markjwas an object of search to the learned for many years. The 
word mark is derived from Mercury, mere, market, etc. Both the term and the thing 
for which it stood were Gothic. The Gothic mark weight was two-thirds of a Roman 
pound weight; the mark of money was and is still two-thirds of a "pound " of account 
in money. History Monetary Systems. 



VASSALIAN POSITION OF THE ANGLO — NORMANS. 31 1 

V. — Roman bronze coins of varied sizes, types and designs also cir- 
culated among the common people and, according to Sir John Lub- 
bock, they continued in circulation down to the present century. We 
are assured by other writers that such was also the case in the other 
states of Europe; the bronze coins of the " Byzantine " empire were 
the only base metal coins in circulation down to and often long after 
the Fall of Constantinople. 

Beside these principal coins the circulation was eked out with the 
silver coins of France, Venice and other states, all of which being re- 
ceivable for public dues under the Roman law at the weight-ratio of 
12 for I of gold, were rated probably at first by the Roman and af- 
terwards by the local authorities at or about this valuation. 

But at best the circulation was a scant one, a fact due less to the 
scarcity of metal, as Mr. Jacob and Sir Archibald Alison have im- 
magined, than to the retention of the prerogative of coinage in the 
hands of the Basileus. There was plenty of gold and silver in the 
mines of England and there is yet; but at that time without the *'per- 
missu divi Augusti" it could not be coined, and at the present time 
without paying discouraging royalties it cannot be mined. 

Sir Matthew Hale, in his " Sheriff's Accounts," proves that during 
the Norman aera farms were let variously upon a money rent (numero) 
or a bullion rent (blanc) but, that in both cases, the actual payments 
were made in kind. Even the payments into the exchequer, which 
Madox would lead us to infer were always made in silver, either ad 
scalam, ad pensum, or by " combustion," were often made with goats 
and pigs. Lord Liverpool's researches led him to the same conclu- 
sion. He says, chapter x, that in the reigns of William I. , and William 
II. , and during a great part of the reign of Henry I. , the king's rents 
arising from his demesnes (which formed at that time an important 
part of the royal revenue), though stipulated in money, were really 
answered in corn, cattle, and other provisions; because money was 
then scarce among the people. ' Such rents continued to be paid in 
kind, down to a still later period; as we are assured by the writer of 
the Black Book, or Liber Niger Scaccarii, who avers that he had con- 
versed with men who saw the rents brought in kind to the king's court. 

The sterlings of Henry I., are of about the same weight as those of 
William I., but not quite so fine. These were followed by emissions 
from the king's mints of debased pieces, which it was afterwards pre- 

^ However, they were commuted for money by Henry I. This was probably after 
his various coinages of silver pennies had rendered money sufficiently plentiful. Ander- 
son's History of Commerce, i, 248-55. 



312 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

tended were counterfeits. Upon instructions, no doubt from the Ro- 
man pontificate, a recoinage was ordered in 1108; and the severest 
sentences were threatened to false coiners. In 11 23, to lend effect to 
these threats, the power of Rome was invoked in aid of the crown; 
and the penalties of the sacred law were added to those of the tem- 
poral. The indifference that was manifested toward these solemn in- 
junctions leads to the suspicion that much of the base coining was 
done under either royal or ecclesiastical authority and by people who 
knew too much about the crimen majestatis to stand in fear of im- 
peachment. * In 1 1 25 the current silver coins had become so corrupt that 
a large proportion of them would not even pass from hand to hand; 
and ninety-four accused persons, among them several privileged mon- 
eyers, underwent mutilation for false coining. Some writers have 
credited Henry I. with " abolishing the oppressive tax of moneyage;" 
but the fact is, that he had no right even to levy such a tax; and its 
abolition should be credited, not to Henry, the knung,but to his mas- 
ter, the pope. 

The only extant coins of Stephen are the sterling pennies of the 
regular Anglo-Norman weight and fineness. There were also debased 
coins, struck in Stephen's name; but these cannot be traced to the 
royal mints. Other debased coins (always of silver) were struck by 
Stephen's illegitimate brother, Henry, bishop of Winchester; by his 
illegitimate cousin Robert, earl of Gloucester; by his two sons, Eu- 
stace and William; as well as by Roger, earl of Warwick, and numer- 
ous other prelates and nobles. In 1139 the sum of forty thousand 
marks, probably in debased silver pennies, was captured in the castle 
of the Devizes, from Roger, bishop of Salisbury. In 1 181 silver coins, 
nominally valued at eleven thousand pounds, and gold coins, prob- 
ably Byzantine, amounting, in value, to three hundred pounds, were 
found in the treasury of Roger, bishop of York. ^ 

Such are the monetary monuments, and such were the monetary 
systems of the Anglo-Norman kings. That attempts were made to 
harmonize the diverse materials of which they were composed — Ro- 
man, early Gothic, Moslem, Anglo-Saxon, Carlovingian, and Byzantine 
— is proved by the intervaluations of Domesday Book and the gradual 
suppression and disappearance of some of these materials, chiefly the 
early Gothic and the Moslem ; but it is equally evident that the attempt 

* In 1362 the abbot of Missenden was convicted of coining and clipping groats and 
sterlings; in 1369 the canon of Dunmore was accused of counterfeiting gold and silver 
coins; and in 1371, the canon of St. Gilbert de Sempingham was charged with secretly 
conveying coins abroad, contrary to law. Ruding, ll, 199-208. 

* Dr. Henry, History of Britain, III, 311. 



VASSALIAN POSITION OF THE ANGLO — NORMANS. 313 

was only partially successful ; and that there yet remained, as, for ex- 
ample, in the mark and pound, an incongruous medley of pagan and 
christian denominations ; and in the divided authority to coin — for ex- 
ample, to the Basileus,gold, and to the kings, nobles, and prelates, silver 
(upon conditions) — another medley which faithfully reflected the gen- 
eral confusion of a period from whosehistory all attempts to deduce an 
independent national existence for either France, England, Germany, 
or Spain, have been unsuccessful and misleading. 

When England became an independent state, she left no room for 
doubt as to her proper status among nations; but to contend that she 
was one during the reign of the Norman kings, almost amounts to a 
slur upon the courage and patriotism of her always brave inhabitants. 
It was not the military power of the Normans that conquered England, 
or kept it in awe, during the medieval period; but the swords,spiritual 
and temporal, of the deathless Roman empire. 



314 



CHAPTER XVIII. 

EARLIEST EXERCISE OF CERTAIN REGALIAN RIGHTS. 

Purity of the English coinages before the Fall of Constantinople — Corrupt state 
afterwards — The change due to the destruction of the Sacerdotal Authority, the dis- 
appearance of the besant, and the assumption of certain regalian rights by the kings 
of England — So long as contracts could be made in gold besants, there was no profit 
in tampering with the silver coinage — Afterwards, such tampering became one of the 
commonest resources of royal finance — Coinage systems of Henry II. — Richard I. — 
John — Henry III. — Edward I. 

THE evidences which will now be brought together to support the 
argument of this work, namely, that England before the Planta- 
genet dynasty was a Fief of the Empire, again relate to those earliest, 
most widely diffused, and most trustworthy of printed documents, the 
coins of the realm. These evidences may be conveniently formulated as 
follows: That previous to the Fall of Constantinople there were but few 
tamperings with the coinage; afterwards such tamperings became ex- 
ceedingly numerous ; a proof that some event had occurred meanwhile 
to render their repetition practicable and profitable,such event having 
been in fact the acquisition by the king,of the coinage rights which the 
Basileus had lost. That previous to the Fall of Constantinople no king 
of England had ventured to strike a gold coin, whereas soon after that 
event and following the example of other princes of the West, a gold 
coin was struck by Henrylll. ; and that although this coin was recalled 
and melted down, it was followed by another one struck by Edward III. 
The issuance of this last-named coin, the gold noble, or half-mark, is 
regarded as the definite declaration of England's independence. 

Reference to the numismatic portions of this work must convince 
the reader that from William I., to Henry II., an interval of nearly a 
century, the coins issued by the kings of England were substantially 
free from degradation or debasement. In other words, the Norman 
kings did not tamper with the coinage. The coins were all of one class, 
namely silver pennies,sometimes also half-pennies,but usually pennies 
only. Although these did not constitute the only money in circulation, 
they were the only money issued by the king. The gold coins of Con- 



EARLIEST EXERCISE OF CERTAIN REGALIAN RIGHTS. 315 

stantinople constituted the backbone of the circulation and kept the 
rest of it straight. So long as contracts could lawfully be made in these 
coins, the kingof England could make no profit by tampering with the 
silver pennies; accordingly, he struck the latter, as nearly as he could, 
to contain exactly the same quantity of fine metal as the gold shilling, 
or quarter-besant, of the Empire. As previously shown, the besant con- 
tained about 73, afterwards 65, grains fine. The gold shilling therefore 
contained 18^, afterwards 16^, grains fine; and this was exactly the 
contents of silver in the two classes of silver pennies of the Heptarchy 
and of the Norman kings; twelve of the lighter of such pennies being 
valued at a shilling and forty-eight at a besant. ' 

With the reign of Henry II.,(Plantagenet) commenced those tam- 
perings with money which announced the advent of sovereign power in 
England and presaged the extinction of Imperial control. Plantagenet 
inherited from his mother the states of Normandy and Maine; from 
his father Touraine and Anjou ; while from his wife, Eleanor, who had 
been divorced from Louis VII., he received Poitou, Saintonge, Angu- 
mois, and Aquitaine; in a word, he became possessed of the entire 
western half of France, from the Channel to the Pyrenees. After add- 
ing these domains to the crown of England, he acquired Northumbria 
by treaty with the king of Scotland, and Ireland (1154) by a grant from 
pope Hadrian IV. The productions and trade of these extensive do- 
mains, together with his share of that additional trade and wealth, 
which, in common with other Christian princes, the king of England 
derived from the suppression and spoliation of the Spanish-Arabian 
empire, are indicated to some extent by the vastly increased revenues 
of crown and mitre, the splendour of the court, and the number and 
wealth of the churches. To this period belongs some of the finest 
specimens of ecclesiastical architecture in England. Yet the monetary 
monuments are still those of a vassal and feudal state. An important 
part of the coinage was struck, valued, and made part of the circulation, 
by one foreign prince, (theBasileus,) v/hilst an important part of the 
revenues were collected and enjoyed by another (the Pope). The in- 
flux of besants,the efflux of Peter's-pence,the defiant issues of baronial 
and ecclesiastical mints, which included leather and tin coins, all be- 
tray the impotency of the king to preserve the National Measure of 
value from degradation and derangement. Of old sterlings there were 
probably few or none in circulation when Henry II. came to the throne, 
but of the base and adulterated coins, issued by the baronial robbers 

' The heavier pennies went at 40 to the besant. The Roman copper coins of the 
medieval period have been alludedto else where. Pagan Gothic copper coins were struck. 



3l6 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

and ecclesiastical forgers, who flourished during the weak reign of 
Stephen, there were many. Among Henry's early cares was the sup- 
pression of these moneys and the issuance in their place of a new coin- 
age, about the year 1156. This coinage, in violation of the king's com- 
mands, was made below the standard; a fault for which he severely 
punished the moneyers. 

About the year 1180'' Henry II. sent to Tours for Philip Aymary, a 
French moneyer, and committed to his charge the striking of a new 
stamp of sterlings. After these were issued, the previous sterlings were 
retired. In executing this work Aymary was himself charged with 
fraud and dismissed to his own country; yet the appearance of the 
coins supposed to have been minted under his superintendence, great 
numbers of which are extant, afford no support to this accusation. The 
pieces are indeed badly executed, and may thus have formed a ready 
temptation to rounders and clippers. The weights, though not on the 
average deficient,are irregular. Perhaps it was on these accounts that 
the foreign artist was so summarily treated. 

The rates of exchange established by the mint between the new ster- 
lings and the old ones — whether the base ones of 11 56 or the rounded 
and clipped ones, is uncertain — prove that the latter were inferior in 
value to the former by about 10 per cent ; at all events, this rate prob- 
ably marks the degree to which clipping extended at this period. For 
y^375 ^3-9 of old clipped money, the mint paid ;!^343:i5 :6 of new; for 
^iooold,;;^89:6:8 new; again, for ;^i 00 old, ^83:6:8 new; and so on.* 
This nova moneta is known to numismatists as short-cross-pennies, 
and these became so popular that they continued to be struck in the 
name of "Henri" until the middle of the reign of Henry III., 1247, al- 
though the reigns of Richard I. and John Lackland intervened. This, 
however, does not necessarily imply that Richard or John struck such 
coins. The extant coins of Henry belong solely to the last issue. A 
hoard of these coins was found at Roylston in 1721. Other pieces, to 
the number of 5700, were found at Tealby in Lincolnshire in 1807. 
They were as fresh as when they left the mint. According to Keary, 
the fineness is o.925,and the contents,in fine silver, of the most perfect 
specimens, 18^ grains. Dr. Ruding's valuable but antiquated work 
gives what seems to be a wholly different account. He says that 5127 
of them weighed 19 lbs. 6 oz. 5 dwts. This is an average of 22 grains 
each, or (assuming the fineness as equal to sterling) 20^ grains fine; 
but as he says nothing of the remaining 573 pieces found at Tealby, 

''The Norman Chronicle states that the new sterling money was struck in 1175. 
Madox, I, 278. ^ Madox, i, 278. 



EARLIEST EXERCISE OF CERTAIN REGALIAN RIGHTS. :• 1 7 

it may be that the average of the whole corresponded with Keary's 
assays. 

With regard to tin money of the nobles, mention of albata, or white 
money (argentum blancum), occurs in the exchequer-rolls pertaining 
to the fourth year of this reign, where it is expressly distinguished 
from silver money (argenti). In the fifteenth year, Walter Hose paid 
one shilling in the pound for the "bianco firmse " of Treatham. In 
the seventeenth year, twenty shillings were paid in " argento bianco ; " 
in the twenty-third year, Walter de Grimesby forfeited a lot of the 
same metal ; in the twenty-sixth year, the sheriffs of London and Mid- 
dlesex paid in, from the effects of a coin-clipper, ;£g:S'-A in silver 
pennies and five marks in "white money." In order to determine the 
meaning of "white money " it is to be remarked that the term "ar- 
gento bianco examinato " was used when silver bullion was meant. 
For example, in the thirtieth year of Henry II., the sheriff of Devon- 
shire paid 2>s. gd. in bullion (argento bianco examinato) made up of 
divers old coins, and in the thirty-third year the same sheriff paid 
twenty-six pennies in bullion (argento bianco examinato) made up of 
numerous coins dug from the earth. Sir Charles Fremantle was of 
opinion that the trial of the pix, mentioned in the Landsdowne ms. , re- 
lated to this reign, " In this opinion the author finds himself unable to 
concur, but believes that it relates to the reign of Edward I. 

Turning from the monetary system of Henry to that of his succes- 
sor, we find it marked by the same characteristics, a full legal-tender 
gold coinage issued by the Basileus and constituting the basis of the 
system; a silver coinage (pennies) issued by the king, as nearly as 
practicable of even weight with, and exactly one-twelfth the value of, 
the Byzantine sicilicus ; and a base coinage of local circulation issued 
by the nobles and ecclesiastics: the gold coinage being never, the sil- 
ver coinage rarely, and the base coinage frequently, altered. 

Although there are no native coins of Richard I. , the evidences that 
he exercised the usual coinage rights of provincial kings, are so nu- 
merous as to leave little room to doubt the fact. In 11S9, upon his 
accession to the throne Richard weighed out more than 100,000 marks 
from his father's treasury at Salisbury; in an ordinance of the same 
year, moneyers at Winchester are mentioned; in the same year he 
granted a local coinage license to the bishop of Lichfield; in 1 190, while 
at Messina on a crusading expedition, he found it necessary to command 
and exhort his followers to accept his money, a tolerably sure indi- 
cation of coinage; and in 1191 Henry de Cornhill was charged in the 

^British Mint Report, 1871, p. 12. 



3l8 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

exchequer accounts with ;^i2oo for supplying the cambium or mints 
of England, (except Winchester,) and with ^400, the profits of the 
cambium for a year. The names of Richard's moneyers in his mints 
at Warwick, Rochester and Carlisle, appear in several texts relating 
to his reign. Coins which were struck in Poitou under his authority 
are still extant. Finally, as will presently appear evident, he granted 
and revoked licenses to nobles and ecclesiastics, to strike tin and 
other base coins. All these prerogatives were such as were now being 
exercised by provincial kings; but Richard struck no gold, and made 
no attempt either to interdict the circulation of the imperial coins or 
to alter the sacred valuation between gold and silver, which was laid 
down in the constitution of the Roman Empire. 

With regard to the Ransom, the inference of new coinage is totally 
wanting. In 1192 Richard was taken prisoner on the continent and 
handed over to Henry VI., of Germany. In 1194 Richard was ran- 
somed for about the same amount of money that he is said to have 
inherited from his father. This ransom was collected in England and 
from the possessions of the English crown in France. From the par- 
ticulars of its collection, to be found in the pages of Madox, it ap- 
pears to have been contributed in coins. Caxton says that plate "was 
molten and made into money." Stowe makes a similar statement, al- 
together ten ancient texts agree in stating that the Ransom was paid 
in money and that the same was answered in "marks weight of Co- 
logne; " which was natural enough, that being the standard of weight 
with which the western emperor was most familiar. Notwithstanding 
this testimony, it may be safely conjectured that there was no new 
coinage ; for such an operation would have been needless, tedious and 
expensive. The old coin and bullion was probably melted down, re- 
fined, cast into bars, assayed, weighed and delivered to the emperor's 
nuncio, a supposition that precisely agrees with Polydore Vergil's ac- 
count of the affair. 

In this same year, 1 194, according to Trivet and Brompton,the king 
decried divers coins of the nobles and ecclesiastics, which remained 
in circulation, and ordained one kind of money to be current through- 
out his realm. ^ Among these various coins were those of tin. Cam- 
den would have us believe that the coinage of tin was a term used to 
denote merely the payment of that forty shillings per one thousand 

^ In this same year, I194, occurs what has been regarded as the earliest mention in 
extant texts of the mark, valued at 13^-. 4af. Fleetwood, 30, from M. Paris; but as shown 
in a previous chapter, the mark of 13J. 4a'. is three or four centuries earlier. The mark 
of 1 1 94 was composed of five gold maravedis ; and 1 3 j. i\d. was its value in silver at the 
Christian ratio of I2 silver for i gold. 



EARLIEST EXERCISE OF CERTAIN REGALIAN RIGHTS. 319 

pounds weight, which was the heirloom of the dukes of Cornwall ; but 
this can only relate to a subsequent period, for there were no dukes 
of Cornwall in the reign of Richard I. 

In 1 196 Henry de Casteillun, chamberlain of London, accounted 
to the king for ;^379:i :6 received for fines and tenths on imported 
tin and other mercatures, also for 16^-. lod. the chattels of certain 
clippers. ® In the same year 39^'. id. were allowed to Odo le Petit, 
in his account for the profit of the king's mint, for erecting therein 
a hutch and forge (fabrica) and utensils for making "albata silver," 
or albata money (dealbandum argentum), also 44^-. for a furnace and 
other devices for working the same. These coins, though struck in 
the royal mint, were not of royal issue, and could have had only a 
local and limited course within the domains of the noble for whom 
they were made. In the same year the sheriff of Worcestershire ac- 
counted for ^40:13:6 albata, or album money, the balance of hisferm 
of the county. Of this sum he had paid ;^i2, in album money, to the 
archbishop of Canterbury, and owed ;^28: 13:6 in album money to the 
exchequer, besides enough more to make up the difference between 
;£i2 silver money and the like sum album money paid to the afore- 
said archbishop. In explaining the use of the term blanc, Madox con- 
fuses blanc silver and blanc money. The former was silver bullion, 
the latter a white money, sometimes called album, made wholly, or 
for the most part, of tin. The meaning of album money is clearly in- 
dicated in several of the exchequer-rolls which he himself cites. '' 

In the same year (1196) the king granted a coinage license to the 
bishop of Durham. In 1198 William de Wroteham accounted at the 
exchequer for the yearly ferm and profits of the mines of Devonshire 
and Cornwall, partly in money and partly in tin bullion. This bullion 
appears to have been sold for tin marks ; for in the 1 3th and 1 4th John, 
who succeeded Richard I. , this same William de Wroteham accounted 
to the king both for his ferm and for the marks obtained from the tin 
(de marcis provenientibusde stanno). It maybe safely inferred that 
in all cases these base coinages were issued by the nobles or eccle- 
siastics and were of limited course. ** The albata money of Richard's 
time was either a composition of tin and silver, a good deal of tin 
and very little silver, or else merely tin coins blanched with silver. 
The clippers, whose chattels were confiscated to the exchequer by 

* Madox, I, 775. ' Madox, i, 280. 

^ The writers who allude to these corrupt coinages are Tindal, Notes to Rapin, i, 
258; Leake, Historical Account of English Money, 58; Nicholson, Eng. History, i, 
254; and the modern writers on tin and base coins. 



320 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

Henry de Casteillnn, must have practiced their art upon the royal 
coins; for there could have been but small profit from exercising it 
upon those of the nobles. 

Although immediately after the payment of his ransom, Richard 
decried all other coins but his own, his edict became a dead letter; 
indeed he was probably glad enough to see the base coins remain in 
circulation. The population of England and Plantagenet France, dur- 
ing the reign of Richard I., was probably not over four or five mill- 
ions, and the total money, not over as many shillings, or say ^^250,000. 
Richard's ransom therefore stripped the kingdom of probably one- 
third or one-fourth of its Measure of Value; and but for the album 
money of his nobles, this circumstance might have brought on far 
greater calamities than the release of the king was expected to avert. 

The main defect of the tin coins was not the low cost of the ma- 
terial of which they were composed. The gold and silver obtained 
from the spoliation of the Moslems and the Jews were cheaper than 
tin, for they cost nothing to produce beyond the labour of cutting so 
many pagan aud infidel throats; whilst tin ore had to be discovered, 
excavated, and reduced to metal. But there was no world-wide de- 
mand and no world's Stock-on-Hand to enhance and steady the value 
of tin ; whilst as to gold and silver, there was ; and this is chiefly what 
has always rendered these metals preferable for coins. Tin coins 
were also easily counterfeited, the material was exposed to rapid oxi- 
dation, and the condition of society and government was wholly un- 
fitted for the use of coins of any material, which could not conve- 
niently and without substantial loss, be buried in the earth for use 
in future and safer times. 

There are no English coins extant of John. It is stated that this 
kinp- sent for certain Easterling artists to refine his silver coins. ' 
These may have been the coins he struck in Ireland, as Lord Para- 
mount of that country, specimens of which still remain. On the other 
hand, they may have been English sterlings, of which no specimens 
with his stamp have yet been found. '" John lost the most of his French 
possessions to Philip II., and thus almost at the outset of his career, 
gained the name of Lackland. His return to England was marked by 
the imposition of fines and aids, which, because they extended to the 
monasteries, earnt for him the curses of the archbishop of York and 

® Anderson's History of Commerce, i, 199. 

'" The Encyc. Brit., art. " Coin," states that since Richard I., all coining has been 
confined to the Tower of London and the provincial mint of Winchester. This is a 
double error. Sir Matthew Hale's account of this matter is the correct one. 



EARLIEST EXERCISE OF CERTAIN REGALIAN RIGHTS. 321 

a defamation of character which extends to the present time. This 
being probably in some measures unjust, should enjoin caution in 
weighing the events of his reign. " Camden ascribes to this period 
the leather money attributed to John; but though belonging to his 
reign, it may have been issued by his vassals. At all events, it wholly 
failed to secure public appreciation. In 1205 John publicly decried 
all coins which were clipped more than an eighth, severely denounced 
and threatened all clippers, especially the Jews, whom he affected to 
believe were the chief offenders, forbade the reblanching of old pen- 
nies, which could have been none other than the tin coins of his no- 
bles, and fixed the rate for exchanging "fine and pure silver at the 
king's exchanges of England and at the archbishop's exchange of Can- 
terbury, at sixpence in the pound." This could not have meant the 
exchange of new coins for old ones by tale, because the latter were 
much worn and clipped. It probably meant the exchange of new coins, 
weight for weight, for old ones. 

More important, however, than the king's coins, were those of the 
Basileus. The form used in England for expressing large sums of money 
proves the still common use of gold besants and Byzantine gold shil- 
lings. For example, in the previous reign, where ^^loo of old coins are 
bought for ;;^83 -.S-.S of new, the sum is thus written in the Great Roll of 
the exchequer : ' ' quartor XX / & LX Vj j- & Vii j d, " meaning four score 
libras, sixty-six solidi, and eight denarii. The former evidently meant 
actual besants and quarter-besants or little solidi. In the Magna Charta 
of this reign. Art. 2, where "centum solidus" is mentioned as the price 
of a knight's relief (a sort of succession duty) it is usually translated as 
"one hundred shillings. " Were these shillings merely moneys of ac- 
count, as is commonly held, it would be difficult to explain why they 
were not expressed in " libras," or pounds of account, like the sums 
which precede them in the same text. They were evidently actual 
quarter-besants, or shillings, and therefore belonged to the gold issues 
of the Basileus. The vassalian coinage of tin, which characterized the 
preceding reigns of Plantagenets, appears to have been also permitted 
by John; for in the thirteenth year of his reign (12 11), William de 
Wroteham paid into the exchequer ^543:5:0, and in the following 
year (12 1 2) ;^668:i2:9, for the money which he was permitted to 
strike from the tin of Cornwall and Devon. "^ The meaning here given 
to this record finds corroboration in the allowance of one-eighth for 
clipped coins, contained in the decree of 1 205, .which would have been 

" Anderson's History of Commerce, i, 193. 

'* Provenientibus de Stanno Cornubiae et Devoniffi. Madox, 11, 132. 



32 2 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

excessive and impracticable in relation to sterling silver, but which, 
when applied to tin or albata coins, was reasonable. 

Two years after John had taken that humiliating oath of vassalage 
to the Pope which is mentioned in another place, he revolted from his 
servitude and, in the Great Charter, which he sealed at Runnymede, 
June 15, i2i5,he assumed powers which only belong to an independent 
monarch. With the fickleness that marked his entire career, he aban- 
doned and violated this charter in the following August; and in Sep- 
tember it was formally annulled by his master, the Pope. Soon after 
this, John was poisoned to death. He was a weak prince, but brief 
though his reign and irresolute his purpose, he earned the glory of exe- 
cuting an Instrument which has served as the model of every Bill of 
Rights won by the people, from that day to the present. Though dis- 
claimed by John and denounced by the Pope, Magna Charta was not 
dead, but lived on ; and both in its inception and repeated confirma- 
tion, it marks the slow and toilsome steps by which the people have 
won, from hierarch,king,and noble, their present inestimable liberties. 

The only silver coins of the reign of Henry III., now extant are the 
sterlings struck in 1248, originally of the usual weight and fineness, but 
for the most part much worn, rounded, and clipped. In addition to 
these issues, certain base coins were in circulation which are reputed to 
have been of foreign fabrication, but which are most likely to have been 
struck by or for English nobles and ecclesiastics. Some of these were 
probably coined in the abbey of St. Albans. When complaint was made 
of them, the transgressors were permitted to avail themselves of a tech- 
nical defense, and so escaped punishment.'^ Heme states that he had 
one of these base coins in his possession and describes its composition.'^ 
The presence of tin money, also struckby the nobles and ecclesiastics, 
is evinced by several contemporaneous references which point to the 
use of that metal for coinage. The following passage from Matthew 
Paris, sub anno 1247, is an example. "As the money was now adulter- 
ated and falsified beyond measure, the king began to deliberate on some 
remedy for this, namely, whether the coins could not be advantageously 
altered in form or metal; but it seemed to many wise persons that it 
would be more advantageous to change the metal, than to alter the 
shape; since it was for the sake of the metal, not the shape, that the 
money was subject to such corruption and injury. " However, as a 
matter of fact, the king did not change either the metal or the shape. 

In the 30th Henry III., the sheriff of Devonshire paid into the ex- 

^^ Madox, I, 759, note x. 

^*W. Henningford, Preface, p. xlv., cited in Ruding, 11, 74. 



EARLIEST EXERCISE OF CERTAIN REGALIAN RIGHTS. 323 

chequer 25^-. id. , the profits of his contract for mining the black metal, 
(nigra minera,) which we take to be tin, that being its usual colour in 
the ore (oxide). He also accounts for 79^-. received from the sale of deal- 
banda and tin. Dealbanda seems to have been a composition of tin, 
like album or albata. He also accounts for ^^6:18:8 profit upon an 
issue of small coins and of ^54:15 13 upon an issue of large coins, (de 
exita majoris cunei), both of which were evidently of tin and were 
emitted by some local magnate. The comparatively small profit thus 
derived by the crown from the issue of tin coins in one of the principal 
tin mining districts of England, implies adwindlingof this coinage. It 
is true that we have no accounts from Cornwall and none from the 
mints, of tin coined during this reign, so that quantitative conclusions 
drawn from this single entry are apt to be misleading. 

Although, as is shown in another chapter, this reign is marked by the 
issue of a native gold coin, the first one ever struck by a Christian king 
of England, the issue was almost immediately retired, and matters re- 
mained apparently as before; so that the besants of the Sacred mint 
continued to form the basis of the English monetary system. But 
though in shrinking from the coinage of gold the king was afraid to 
definitely repudiate the suzerainty of the Sacred empire, the nobles and 
the burghers were not. The General Council of 1 247 resolved to lower 
the standard of royal silver coins, an act which by itself is almost suf- 
ficient to mark the fall of the Sacred empire and the declining authority 
of Rome. " Corrupt coins made their appearance in all directions, 
counterfeit coins at St. Albans, tin coins in Cornwall and Devon, base 
and clipped coins everywhere.*® It is now evident that at this juncture 
the besant began to disappear from circulation and that its agency in 
regulating the English monetary system was sensibly diminished; but 
in the sera of the Plantagenets no such explanation of coinage diffi- 
culties offered itself. In that age the solution of all monetary problems 
was found in torturing the Jews. Henry had resorted to this measure 
before the decision of the General Council.'^ He now resorted to it 
again. It was a pretty theory, a furtive belief in whose efficacy is not 
yet wholly effaced from the minds of men ; but it did not work. With 
the second persecution of the Jews the besants became still scarcer; 
and, as for lack of them, contracts could no longer be discharged with 
them, the use of other coins was rendered unavoidable and the mul- 
tiplication of base or overvalued ones was thus encouraged. One of the 
last contracts in which the consideration is specifically expressed in 

*^ The profits of this coinage are shown in Ruding, 11, 67. '^ Ruding, 11, 74. 
" The Second massacre of the Jews was in 1264. 



324 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

besants, is still extant. It is a Hebrew bond and mortgage, executed 
duringthereignof Henry III., a complete English translation of which, 
by Dr. Samuel Pegge,the antiquarian, appeared in the Gents Magazine, 
i756,p.465. The besants are therein called "lakuof gold," in allusion 
to the radiated figure which is stamped upon all the later issues, laku 
being the Hebrew form of the Greek lacchus and Roman Bacchus. 

The division of the pound of account into twenty parts and each of 
these into twelve, was in this reign extended to the pound weight, used 
for the assize of bread, and still more strangely, was it imitated in the 
subdivisions of the agrarian acre. By the act 51 Henry III., (1267,) it 
was provided, among other things, that "when a quarter of wheat is 
i2d. per quarter, then wastel bread of a farthing shall weigh^6:i6j."; 
by which we suppose was meant 64-5 pounds' weight.'^ A similar en- 
actment was made as to acres. The acre was divided into 160 pence, or 
320 half-pence, or 640 farthings, so that it tallied with the subdivisions 
of the mark of account." Thus denariatus terrse, a penny of land, 
meant a rod or perch, because the perch was the 1 60th part of an acre, 
as the penny was the i6oth part of a mark.^" So the obolus, or half- 
penny, of land, meant half-a-perch, and the quadrante, or farthing of 
land meant a quarter of a perch, or 4^^ square feet. The expression 
"40 great, long perches of candles," quoted in Anderson's History 
of Commerce, and the use of ' ' shillings, " for ounces, in the mint ac- 
counts of Henry III., are puzzling.''' This application of the divisions 

'^ Martin Folkes, Table of English Silver Coins; Harris on Coins, i, 51. 

'^ Bishop Fleetwood's Chronicon Preciosum, p. 40. 

'" That weights are derived from coins — and not coins from weights, as is commonly 
supposed — appears to be demonstrated from the earlier English statutes on this subject. 
That of 51 Henry III., A. D. 1266, says: "An English penny, called a sterling, round 
and without clipping, shall weigh 32 wheat corns in the midst of the ear, and twenty 
pence to make an ounce, and twelve ounces one pound." The statute of 12 Henry VII., 
(1496,) declares that "the pound Troy shall consist of 12 ounces each of 20 sterlings 
or pennyweights, each of the weight of 32 corns of wheat that grew in the middle of the 
ear." It is evident in both these cases that the weight of the ounce and pound Troy was 
derived from that of the sterling, and not the sterling from the pound Troy. Because 
the latter contains what is now determined to be 5760 grains, it does not follow that 
the pound sterling, or pound of account, consisted of 20 x 12 = 240 sterlings each of 
24 grains of silver. This is the common belief, but it is erroneous. We possess thousands 
of sterlings of both these reigns, but none of them contain so much as 24 grains of silver, 
because they are all composed of a variable alloy of copper, which, at the least, amounts 
to vX percent, and sometimesto I2>4 percent, which alloy, in constructing the pound 
weight and in calculating the pound of account, was reckoned as so much silver, 

=" Anderson, Com. i, 178, and Ruding, i, 179. The term "shilling" appears to have 
been used also in the mint accounts of this reign, for an ounce weight. Fleetwood, 
Ruding, etc. The origin of this practice is obscure. Twelve sterlings (value one shilling) 
weighed less than half an ounce; so it could not have been derived from this analogy. 
Perhaps it was due to the use of tin or albata pennies, of which twelve may have roughly 
weighed an ounce. 



EARLIEST EXERCISE OF CERTAIN REGALIAN RIGHTS. 325 

of imaginary moneys, to weights and measures, was not peculiar to 
England. It is to be found in all the kingdoms which grew out of the 
Roman provinces; for the custom is as ancient as the Empire itself. 
Wine measures were based on the Roman ace, which was the integer, 
and consisted of twelve cyathi. Thus, a cup of twocyathi, was called 
a sextans, three cyathi a triens, four cyathi a quadrans, etc., after 
the names of Roman coins. ^^ 

Many modern economists and writers on money have argued that 
because, by the law of 1267, a ^ meant a pound weight, as applied 
to bread, therefore it meant a pound weight of silver, as applied to 
coins; that because an s. meant the twentieth of a pound weight, as 
applied to bread, therefore it meant the twentieth of the pound weight 
of silver, as applied to coins ; and that as a d. meant the 240th part of a 
pound weight, as applied to bread, it meant the 240th part of a pound 
weight of silver as applied to coins. This mode of reasoning, if applied 
to the subdivisions of the acre, would lead to very startling results. 
For example, because by law a mark meant the whole, and a penny 
the i6oth part, of an acre, therefore when applied to coins, the mark 
meant an acre of silver and the penny, a perch of that metal! 

Another fallacy of money, one of practical importance at the pres- 
ent time, derives its origin from the monetary issues of this period. 
Jevons, in his "Money and Exchange," avers that the "standard" 
of England from the reign of the Plantagenets to that of the House 
of Brunswick, was silver, and afterwards gold. This is one of a host 
of modern sophistries which have sprung from the Act of 1666; and 
which no one, before that period, ever stumbled upon. It will be 
found in Harris' " Essays on Money and Coins " printed in 1757 and 
possibly in somewhat older books, although neither so old as the Act 
of 18 Charles II., nor as that story of the disputative knights and the 
shield, which on the one side, was of yellow metal, and the other, of 
white. In the case of money, the shield was neither of one metal nor 
the other. The term "standard," as used by Jevons, can only mean 
measure, and neither gold nor silver metal was ever the measure of 

'^^ Adams, 396. The custom is accounted for by M. de Vienne. In 9th John the Cam- 
bium of London (the Mint) charged in its accounts, "for gold weighing xxi shillings 
and viii pence, x /."; that is, for as much gold as weighed down 260 silver pennies 
(weights) they charged ;^io, or 2400 pennies (money). This bespeaks a ratio of about 
9 for I. In Tetuan (Morocco) house property is charged with a water rent which is regu- 
lated by the size of the main water pipe that enters the house. This pipe is not measured 
by dhra 'a or by tomins, but by " the size of a coin of given denomination and date; 
a simple measure, always accessible." Talcott Williams, 'Historical Survivals in Mo- 
rocco," N. Y., 1890, pamph., p. 34. 



o 



26 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 



value in England until 1666; while, since that date, it has been such 
only to a limited extent, and under the operation of that act, as af- 
fected by subsequent legislation. Down to 1666 the "standard" of 
England was the whole number of ^ s. d. in the kingdom, whether 
of gold, silver, tin, copper, or leather; and the whole number of ^ s. d. 
was whatever the combined coinages of Basileus, king, barons, and 
prelates, conspired to make it. In the course of the present work 
many instances have been given when the king altered the measure 
or "standard " of value by simple decree and without increasing or 
diminishing the quantity of either gold or silver; an irrefragable proof 
that the "standard " was not either of these metals, nor any other 
metal; but merely the number of jT^ s. d., whether coined, or exist- 
ing by the king's will. Had either gold or silver metal been the 
"standard" of value, that standard would have been beyond the power 
either of Basileus, pope, or king, to alter. It needs but a cursory pe- 
rusal of the annals of the time to be convinced that such was not the 
case, and that in fact gold and silver metal had very much less to do 
with measuring value than the imperial and royal constitutions and 
edicts. 

Edward I., Longshanks, had lived many years at the court of Al- 
fonso El Sabio, and according to Calcott, (i, 461,) he had received 
knighthood from him. Here he had doubtless learnt those methods 
of asserting the independence of his future crown from the suzerainty 
of Rome, which Alfonso employed in his newly established Siete Parti- 
das. Upon ascending the throne of England Edward found the coin- 
age of his country in great confusion and very corrupt. The sterlings 
of Henry III., badly executed and so much worn and rounded or 
clipped, that they contained but half their original weight of silver; 
the base silver coins of the nobles and ecclesiastics, which had in great 
degree replaced them in the circulation; the gold besants and mara- 
vedis which the Jews and goldsmiths hoarded for export; and the 
numerous foreign silver coins which had crept into the circulation; 
combined to form a melange of money which was impossible to re- 
place and troublesome to improve. Before making any efforts in this 
direction the king commenced to fill his treasury by robbing the Jews 
and the goldsmiths, putting great numbers of the former to a cruel 
death and throwing the latter into prison. In the reign of Edward III. , 
there were few or no Jews left to kill, so the king robbed the Lom- 
bards ; in that of Charles I. , there were no Lombards, so the king rob- 
bed the goldsmiths. Edward Longshanks' apology for slaying the 
Jews was that they circulated base money, but in fact everybody did 



EARLIEST EXERCISE OF CERTAIN REGALIAN RIGHTS. 327 

this, including the king himself, for there was at one period practi- 
cally little other money in circulation. Their real crime was the hoard- 
ing of that gold which the king coveted. 

Edward's raid upon the Jews and goldsmiths was made in 1279, the 
eighth year of his reign. As a makeweight to this transaction, he 
affected great concern for the purity of the silver coins purchased with 
this innocent blood. In the ninth or tenth year of his reign he or- 
dered the barons of the exchequer to "open the boxes of the assay 
of London and Canterbury, and to make the assay in such a manner 
as the king's council were wont to do. " ^^ Nothing is said in these in- 
structions about the base coints minted at St. Albans ; nor the coinage 
of tin in Devon and Cornwall; nor the issues of leather moneys at 
Conway, Caernarvon, and Beaumaris; nor the pollards and crockards, 
valued in other royal edicts; nor the light coins, called, from their 
devices. Mitres and Lions; nor the Cocodones, Rosaries, Stepings, 
and Scaldings; " nor the three sorts of copper coins which this king 
issued, after cunningly plating or washing them with silver. Lowndes, 
with some intemperateness, attributes to this reign "the most re- 
markable deceits and corruptions found in ancient records to have 
been committed upon coins of the kingdom. " Nothing is said of these 
matters in Edward's instructions concerning a trial of the pix and 
nothing is said of them in modern numismatic works," Yet these cor- 
ruptions of money have the highest historic value. Just, as in after 
times, the New England shilling first announced the stern resolution 
of her people to be free, and the * ' Continental " note proclaimed and 
asserted that freedom, so did the leather notes and base coins of Ed- 
ward's reign mark the parting of that mighty cable which held the 
province of Britain to the sinking ship of the Empire. The laws of 
politics, like those of pathology, are not gained by study of the healthy 
or the normal; but by observing the diseased and the abnormal. 

In 1289 an indented trial piece of the goodness of old sterling (0.925 
fine) was ordered to be lodged in the exchequer and "every pound 
weight Troy was to be shorn at twenty shillings and three-pence, ac- 
cording to which the value of the silver in the coin was one shilling 
eight-pence farthing an ounce." So says Lowndes, 34, citing the Red 
Book of the Exchequer, but this citation only conveys part of the 
truth, the remainder being supplied by Dr. Ruding. This more con- 
scientious author states, with reference to sterling coins, that from 

'^^ Madox, I, 291. ■* Fleetwood, 39, 47. 

^^ For leather issues of this reign consult Ruding, 11 130, and "Money and Civiliza- 
tion, " p. 64. 



328 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

the Conquest down to the year 152 7, the royal mints of England bought 
bullion by the pound Troy (5760 grains) and sold it by the pound 
Tower (5400 grains); so that even when the buying and selling price 
was the same, there remained to the crown a profit of about seven per 
cent.-® The weight of Edward's sterling pennies, many of which, in 
a perfect state of preservation, are still extant, corroborate this state- 
ment. If we assume, with the Red Book, that Edward paid 243 sterling 
pence per pound Troy for sterling silver bullion — which is doubtful, 
for there were probably deductions made from this price to cover the 
cost of coinage — the coins prove that he sold it at 260 pence per Troy 
pound, or, which is the same thing, 280 pence per Tower pound. Ac- 
cording toKeary's assays, the extant sterling pennies weigh 22^ grains, 
0.9667^ fine, equal to about 20^ grains net; but these relate to ex- 
ceptionally heavy specimens. 

In the same year, (1289,) says the Black Book, Edward sent for for- 
eign moneyers to teach him how to make and forge moneys. Forging 
here means simply striking. It does not relate to the forged coins 
which were current in this reign and which Edward's apologists im- 
puted to the foreigners and the Jews, but which it is much to be 
feared were made with the connivance and for the profit of that in- 
genious prince himself. However, the Jews suffered for the forgeries 
all the same ; for in the very next year Edward plundered and ban- 
ished the remainder of them from the kingdom." In 1298, (27 Ed- 
ward I.,) it was commanded that all persons, of whatever country or 
nation, may safely bring to our exchanges ^^ any sort or sum of good 
silver coins, or bullion, which shall be valued or reduced by the as- 
sayers according to the "old standard" of England. Silver bullion, 
when assayed and stamped with its value at our exchanges, may be 
used as a medium of barter, that is to say, as money." This was 
similar to a Brazilian regulation of the sixteenth century; and so far 
as it attempted to give currency to bullion, it proved quite as im- 
practicable and futile.'" It was also provided by 27 Edward I., that 

^^ The statute of the Pillory and Tumbrel and of the Assize of Bread and Ale, 51 
Henry III., (1266,) provides punishment for those "that sell by one measure and buy 
by another " ; a proof that the royal example had become contagious. A similar interdict 
against buying and selling by different measures occurs in Mahomet's Koran. 

-'' See Forgery, confession, and pardon, of Sir William Thurington, in the reign of 
Edward VI. 

^* The "exchanges" were offices in the mint for exchanging coins. Madox, i, 291. 

^^ This could only mean the value of the silver with reference to gold, a value which 
the coins of the Basileus still imposed and fixed. 

^^ Free. Met., p. 119; Money and Civ., pp. 17, 78, 146. 



EARLIEST EXERCISE OF CERTAIN REGALIAN RIGHTS. 329 

no bullion shall be exported out of the country without special license. 
This prohibition was repeated by Edward II., in 1307, thus implying 
that it had meanwhile been successfully evaded. This and some other 
acts of the Plantagenets, which encroached upon the imperial prerog- 
atives of Rome, must be recognized as efforts on the part of these 
kings of England to throw off their allegiance to the empire. But it 
was not yet quite thrown off. Iniagg (28 Edward I.,) it was provided 
that silver plate shall be of no worse standard than coins. Gold-plate 
shall be no worse than the "touch " of Paris. All plate shall be as- 
sayed by wardens of the craft and marked with a leopard's head. The 
wardens shall visit the goldsmith's shops and confiscate all plate of a 
lower standard. This was a new exercise of royal authority. 

With regard to the pollards, crockardsand other base coins of the 
reign, Dr. Ruding assumes, apparently because they were base, or be- 
cause their coinage does not appear to be provided for in the laws or 
mint indentures, that they were of foreign fabrication and surrepti- 
tious circulation; but this does not follow. Base issues were the rule, 
not the exception, of this reign. It is mere prejudice to heap them 
upon Phillip le Bel and other French kings and omit them from the 
records of the English monarchy. Base coins were quite as common 
in England as in France ; they were due to similar circumstances ; they 
were attended by similar social phenomena; they had similar results; 
and no good can come of their suppression, concealment, or false as- 
cription, by modern historians. Pollards and crockards appear in the 
circulation so early as 1280. In 1303 (32 Edward I.,) the "custodes 
of the Ordinance for the Money at Ipswick " were charged upon the 
exchequer-rolls with ^^14:4:11 for pollards and crockards.^' If these 
were foreign and unlawful coins, it is difficult to account for their use 
in the royal treasury and their appearance and recognition in the royal 
accounts. In 2 Edward II., (1308,) there is an entry of a relief granted 
to the king's sheriffs and bailiffs, who had received these coins "then 
current" at a penny each, which "by the king's proclamation were 
fallen from a penny to a half-penny." ^^ Does this look like a refer- 
ence to foreign or discredited coins? The king's officers are first re- 
quired to receive them at a penny and afterwards at a half-penny each, 
and royal relief is granted to them for such of this class of coins as 
had accumulated in their hands during the royal alteration in their 
legal value. That they were in use during the whole of the reign of 
Edward I. ,and part of that of his successor is of itself almost sufficient 
proof of their legality. It has been stated that they were decried in 

*' Madox, I, 294. ^^ Madox, i, 294. 



330 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

1300 (29 Edward I). It is possible that this was the date when they 
were lowered by proclamation; but the entries above quoted prove 
that they actually continued in use for several years afterwards. As 
to their omission from the laws and mint indentures, there are no such 
instruments extant. With a fragmentary and unimportant exception, 
all instruments relating to the coinage, previous to 18 Edward III., 
if any existed, which is very doubtful, have been lost or destroyed. 

The extant sterlings ascribed to the first and second Edwards are 
not distinguishable, one from the other. Numismatists assign those 
with the name composed of the fewest number of letters, as "Edw," 
to Edward I. ; those with more letters, as "Edwa," to Edward II. ; and 
those with the full name, "Edwardus," to Edward III. This classifica- 
tion is attributed to archbishop Sharp, a numismatist of the last cent- 
ury, whose reasons for its adoption are, however, far from convincing. " 
In respect of the groats, bishop Sharpe's capricious arrangement was 
as capriciously reversed, for there the full spelf'Edwards" are ascribed 
to Edward I. , and the abbreviated Edwards to his successor. For the 
reason that Lowndes' citation from the Red Book merely relates to 
the buying price of silver at the exchequer, and as there is no certainty 
that any of the extant coins were struck by Edward I., and finally be- 
cause it is incredible, in such a condition of society as existed during 
this reign, that sterlings should have remained in a circulation already 
filled with tin, copper,and leather issues, we should deem it quite likely 
that no sterlings at all were issued during this reign, were it not for a 
circumstance recorded by bishop Fleetwood, namely, that Edwards' 
sterlings were valued at the time at two, three, or four pence, or ster- 
lings, each, a custom quite common both in England and France dur- 
ing the whole period, from the thirteenth to the fifteenth centuries, but 
commonly ignored or suppressed by modern writers on the subject.'^ 

Among his other issues, Edward struck silver coins weighing 80,85, 
92, 116, and 138 grains each, which are regarded variously as groats, 
shillings, medals, etc., but which might have passed as half-marks, or 
even marks, for all that can be learnt from the few records now left of 
his numerous issues and their capricious valuations. The whole sum 
of money coined during this reign is estimated by Dr. Ruding at less 
than ;^i6,ooo; but as this calculation leaves out of viewthe enhanced 
legal valuation of the sterlings, it is of little worth. ^° The native mines 

^^ Ruding, II, 123, from Bib. Top. Brit., No. xxxv., p. 25. Per contra, see Leake, 

p. 8, and Folkes. 

^* Fleetwood, 34, 35, 39, etc., and "Present State of England." 

^^ Consult Humphreys, 140; Sir M. Hale in Davis' Reports, ed. 1674, p. 18; Drier's 

Jiep.,7thed.,vi.,fol.82; Madox,i,294; "Money and Civilization," 65; Ruding,ll.,i29. 



EARLIEST EXERCISE OF CERTAIN REGALIAN RIGHTS. 331 

produced some small amounts of silver in this reign. Those of Mar- 
tinstowe in Devonshire yielded 370 lbs. weight of silver in 1294, 521 
lbs. in 1295, and 704 lbs. in 1296; after which they seem to have been 
abandoned as unprofitable. ^® An assay of silver from the mine of Byr- 
lande in Devon, was made in 24 Edward I. " The assumption of control 
over the mines, which the rendition of these accounts imply, was also 
a new exercise of royal authority.'^ The system of ;Q s. d. remained 
unchanged, but what constituted a pound of account was now quite 
within the King's newly assumed powers to determine, at pleasure. 
The king's prerogative, to raise or lower moneys, or to enhance or 
diminish their value, or to reduce them to bullion, a prerogative which 
had only been assumed by Henry II., when the Sacred empire drew 
to its close, and was only asserted after the Empire had expired, devel- 
oped, during the course of Edward's reign, into a practical form. The 
hour of England's complete independence was at hand. 

3® Jacob, 195. '' Madox, i, 291. 

^^ The earliest assertion of the doctrine of "Mines Royal" which was made by any 
European sovereign after the Fall of Constantinople occurs in the "Siete Partidas" of 
Alfonso El Sabio. " CartillaPractica," Burdeos, 1838. (Br.Mn.Library,No.7io6,f.4.) 



332 



CHAPTER XIX. 

GRADUAL DEVELOPMENT OF ENGLISH NATIONALITY. 

No mint indentures prior to Edward I. — No statutes of any kind previous to Magna 
Charta — Sudden beginning of frequent monetary changes in tlie reign of Edward II. 
— Significance of this movement — Progressive assumption of regalian rights — Lower- 
ing of pollards and crockards — Interdiction of commerce in coins and bullion — Lower- 
ing of sterlings — Establishment of a Maximum — Coinage of base money by the king 
— His death — Accession of Edward III. — New monetary ordinances — Black money — 
Mercantile system — Tin money — Review of the gold question — The maravedi of Henry 
III. — Preparation of Edward III. to issue gold coins — Permission from the Emperor 
— Convention with Flanders — Authority of parliament — Issue of the double florin — 
Its immediate retirement — Fresh preparations — Issue of the gold noble or half-mark 
— Its great significance. 

NO written annals so plainly mark the steps by which England 
gradually developed from the provincial to the national phase 
of its existence, as those which are stamped upon the coinages of the 
second and third Edwards. Before describing these issues, one or two 
observations are necessary. With the exception of the statute 28 
Edward I., already cited, not a single indenture of the mint,from 1066 
to 1346, is extant at the present day ; nor is there any reason to sup- 
pose that any ever existed. If negative evidence were admissible in 
an enquiry of the present kind, this fact would be conclusive. It fur- 
nishes the inference that down to the sera of the Plantagenets the 
princes of England did not enjoy control of the coinage and had neither 
occasion nor authority to prescribe its regulations. The continued 
coinage and circulation of the gold solidus by the Basileus, its recogni- 
tion by the Latin pontificate, and the prescriptive ratio of 12 silver for 
I gold, rendered the coinage of silver by the king a mere perfunctory 
act. The silver penny coined by Christian princes had to be of the 
same weight as the gold shilling coined by the Basileus. When the 
penny failed to conform to this rule, it failed to circulate, and the 
Council of the Lateran was certain to seal the prejudices of the public 
with its official condemnation of the heretical coin. But no sooner 
was the power of the Basileus extinguished, than all this began to 
change, and every prince of Christendom stretched out his hands to 



GRADUAL DEVELOPMENT OF ENGLISH NATIONALITY. 333 

grasp the coveted prerogative of coinage. The Gothic princes,as usual, 
were the foremost. It was a Gothic prince of Leon who next after the 
emperor Frederick struck the first Christian coin of gold, and a Gothic 
prince of Denmark who first openly repudiated the suzerainty of pont- 
ifical Rome.' It need hardly be added that in such a cause the Gothic 
kings of England were not behind their compeers. Gold coinage began 
with Henry III., and mint indentures with Edward III. 

Not only are there no mint indentures before the fourteenth century, 
there are no national laws of any kind previous to the Fall of Con- 
stantinople. The earliest entry in the Statutes at Large is an altered 
copy of Magna Charta, not drawn from any official registry, but fished 
out of an antiquarian collection. Hardly more creditable is the ap- 
pearance of the ordinances which follow it, down to the reign of Ed- 
ward III. ^ They have all the appearance of having been "restored" 
in modern times. If the kings of England previous to Edward III. 
were not vassals, why have we none of their ordinances; and if the 
Pope or the Emperor was not their suzerain, why do the marks of the 
latter's superior authority appear in this, as indeed they do in every 
kind of literary record, except indeed upon the pages of recently 
written British history? 

However, it is not alone upon literary evidence that our argument 
relies ; it stands also upon the far more certain evidence of coins and 
the nummulary grammar. Many of these evidences have been already 
adduced. Those which will now be furnished relate chiefly to the 
sudden and frequent alterations of money which began after the Fall 
of Constantinople and culminated in the reign of Edward III. There 
are indeed many modern writers who either affirm or assume that no 
such alterations took place; but the evidence against them is over- 
whelming. From the accession of Edward I., to the coinage of gold 
by Edward III. , is a period which corresponds with the reigns of Philip 
le Hardie, Philip le Bel, Louis Hutin, Philip le Long, Charles le Beau, 
and Philip Valois, when we are taught that hundreds, almost thousands, 
of alterations were made in the monetary system of France, of which 
country a part still remained subject to the kings of England. In the 
single year 1346, reign of Philip Valois, there are recorded no less than 
ten alterations of the ratio between gold and silver in the French coin- 
age. As to the debasements and degradations of Philip le Bel, every 

' " Waldemar, King of Denmark, etc. To the Bishop of Rome, Greeting: We hold 
our life from God; our kingdom from our subjects; our riches from our parents; and 
ourfaith from thee; which, if thou wilt not grant us any longer, we do by these presents 
resign. Farewell." Boulainvilliers', " Life of Mahomet," ed. 1752, p. iii. 

^ These ordinances are not in the English, but tl;e Roman, language. 



334 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

historical work is full of them. Yet all this time, while a furious storm 
of monetary changes and financial shifts were raging across the Chan- 
nel and whirling into every nook and corner of the English possessions 
in France, the numismatists and political economists assure us that 
England lay in the midst of a dead calm, and that nothing of the sort 
happened there. How utterly unfounded is the inference upon which 
they rest so confidently, will be seen when the positive evidence of the 
extant coins is unfolded. 

The wave of monetary alterations which distinguishes this period 
began in Gothic Spain, whence it flowed into Gothic France and Eng- 
land. The changes which began in France with Philip le Hardie and 
became so numerous under Philip le Bel and his successors, have rarely 
been correctly described and never fully understood. Even Mr. Hal- 
lam, one of the ablest and most impartial of historical writers, must 
have failed to grasp the significance of these transactions, when he 
stigmatized them by the coarse names of fraud and robbery. "The 
rapacity of Philip le Bel kept no measure with the public. . . . Dis- 
satisfaction and even tumults arose in consequence. . . . The film had 
now dropped from the eyes of the people, and these adulterations of 
money, rendered more vexatious by continued recoinages of the cur- 
rent pieces, upon which a fee was extorted by the moneyers, showed 
in their true light as mingled fraud and robbery. " ^ The fidelity of this 
description is discredited by Mr.Hallam himself, who, elsewhere says: 
" These changes seemed to have produced no discontent," an admis- 
sion that ill agrees with the imaginary dissatisfaction and tumults 
above set forth. That the crux of the situation is misunderstood by 
this writer is evident from the absence in his pages of all allusion to 
the Fall of the Empire, and the recent acquisition of its coinage pre- 
rogatives by the Christian states of the West. 

If we turn from Mr. Hallam's condemnation of Philip le Bel to his 
approval of his contemporaries, the princes of England, we shall find 
even less cause to be satisfied with his opinions on this subject. In 
the former case they find some apology in the defamation with which 
the medieval ecclesiastics pursued Philip for curtailingtheirprivileges 
and restraining their rapacity; in the latter, he is left with the poor 
defence of patriotic partiality. Says the historian: " It was asserted 
in the reign of Philip le Bel as a general truth that no subject might 
coin silver money. The right of debasing the coin was also claimed 
by this prince as a choice flower of the crown." Whilst, a little farther 
on, in the same paragraph, he says: "No subject ever enjoyed the 

* Hallam's " Middle Ages," chapter ii. 



GRADUAL DEVELOPMENT OF ENGLISH NATIONALITY. 335 

right, (I do not extend this to the fact,) of coining silver in England, 
without the royal stamp and superintendence, a remarkable proof of 
the restraint in which the feudal aristocracy was always held in this 
country. " If in fact the nobles and ecclesiastics of England exercised 
the privilege of coining siver, as we know they did, it is difficult to 
see wherein they were under greater restraint than the same classes 
elsewhere. But this is not all. Mr. Hallam's flourish goes farther. It 
implies that the prerogative to coin, which he represents to have been 
so sadly abused by Philip, was more rightfully or more justly exer- 
cised by his contemporaries the English princes. 

Such is not the opinion of the earlier English writers. Our Matthew 
Paris says that the coins of his own time were adulterated and falsi- 
fied beyond measure. Holinshed II., 318, says that notwithstanding 
the baseness of the father's coins, the son, Edward II., proclaimed 
them to be good and current money. Stowe, (326,) says that Edward 
II., ordered that his father's base coins should not be refused on pain 
of life and limb; and Carte prefers a similar accusation.* Indeed the 
text of the proclamation (4 Edward II.,) which contains this mandate, 
is extant to justify the medieval chroniclers. Lowndes (eighteenth 
century) says that the greatest deceits and corruptions known to his- 
tory were committed in the coinages of Edward I., and Lord Liver- 
pool, who wrote during the present century, reluctantly confesses in 
a letter to the king the adulterations of money which were inaugu- 
rated by the Plantagenets.* 

We shall presently offer even better testimony than the opinions of 
historians, namely, the evidence of the coins themselves. It will then 
be seen not only that England fully kept pace with France in the wild- 
est excesses of a now unrestrained right to coin, but also that these 
excesses, in which Mr. Hallam only perceives fraud and robbery, really 
constitute our most valuable proofs of England's approach toward 
national autonomy. They are the unsteady steps of tutelage which 
preceded the firm march of an actual and independent sovereignty. 

The year 1307 (i Edward II.,) is the most probable date when the 
value of the pollards and crockards was lowered one-half. In effect, 
it was decreed that that which was yesterday a penny, to-day shall 
be but a half-penny and that which yesterday constituted a pound 
shall be to-day but ten shillings.* In the same year was also enacted 
an explicit interdict against the exportation of either coined money 
or bullion from England.' A similar interdict was made in 1326.' It 

<" History of England," II, 308. *" Letter to the King," chapter ix. « Madox,l,294. 
^ Eggleston, Antiq., p. 196. « Ruding, 11, 136. 



^;^6 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

does not appear to have occurred to the crown that the Jews, banished 
to the continent, had it largely within their power to prevent the ship- 
ment of foreign moneys to England, by paying for English merchan- 
dise with bills of exchange drawn against foreign merchandise shipped 
to England. In this way they could and doubtless did, intercept and 
prevent the shipment to that country of some of the coins or bullion 
which would otherwise have been remitted to it to pay for its exports. 
Many people, even at the present day, similarly fail to comprehend 
the operation of exchange. Their view is that unless every nation 
makes its money of the same material as other nations, it will place 
itself in the position of being unable to pay its foreign debts. A les- 
son from practical bill-drawers would greatly tend to alleviate such 
an apprehension. 

In 1310 the Commons petitioned and represented to the king that 
the coins were depreciated (meaning probably not in value, but in con- 
tents of silver) more than one-half. " Nevertheless the king made pro- 
clamation the same year that the coins should be current at the value 
they bore under Edward I., and that no one should enhance the price 
of his goods on that account. This is the edict of which Holinshed, 
Stowe, and Carte complain. Mr. Jewett " says that the petition of 
the Commons set forth that the coins, probably meaning the old ster- 
lings, were dipt down to one-half. This was very likely, because un- 
less the silver coins were cut down so as not to contain any more 
silver than the base coins of like denomination, they would have dis- 
appeared altogether. But this time it could not have been the Jews 
who committed the offence, for there were no Jews now in England. 
Nor should the Caursini, Peruchi, Scali, Fiscobaldi, Ballardi, Reisardi, 
or other Roman clans or families who filled their places in the English 
marts and exchanges, be suspected; for these were all good Christians 
and therefore presumably loyal subjects. Clippers and counterfeiters 
had been condemned to excommunication by the Council of the Lat- 
eran in 11 23 and were subject, by a statute attributed to Edward I., 
to the penalty for treason. " Earth denounced such sacrilegious crimi- 
nals, and heaven forbade them to approach its holy precincts. We 
are therefore at a loss to look for the transgressor, unless indeed he 
was to be found in the royal sanctuary itself. It may have been with 
the object to more effectually keep his base money afloat that the king 
by proclamation in 13 10 forbade, under heavy penalties, the importa- 
tion of false moneys. If these false moneys were close imitations of 

' Rolls of Par. i, App. p, 444, and clause 4 Edward II. ,m. in 12 dors. Ruding, 11, 133. 
"* Antiquities, 146. " Ruding, 11, 214, 226. 



GRADUAL DEVELOPMENT OF ENGLISH NATIONALITY. 337 

the king's base coins and contained the same proportion of fine silver, 
the practice of importing them infers that prices had not risen to the 
level of the debasement. 

In 131 1 the Lords Ordainers enacted that no changes should be 
made in the value of the coins without consent of the barons in par- 
liament assembled. This startling declaration amounted to a claim 
on the part of the nobles for a share in those regalian rights which the 
king was daily acquiring from the falling power of Rome; but it was 
successfully resisted by Edward, who in 1321, repeated the ordinance 
at York. There are no records relating to its operation in the inter- 
val. According to the roll of 9 Edward II., the king commanded 
Richard Hywysh, sheriff of Cornwall, by writ, to pay on his account 
jQzT^ '-^A'A to Antony di Pessaigne, of Janua, out of the profits of the 
tin coinage (coignagio stagminis). '^ Indeed tin money and gold money 
appear to have been struck by the western princes at the same time 
and owing to the same parent event, the fall of the Basileus. There 
being then a great deal of false money in circulation, a writ was issued 
in 13 18 to the barons of the exchequer, commanding them to order 
the sheriffs of England to make proclamation that "no man should 
import into the realm clipped money or foreign counterfeit money un- 
der great penalties and that such persons as had any clipped money 
in their hands should bore it through in the middle and bring it to the 
king's cambium to be recoined." " This proclamation must have had 
some other than its professed object, for in the same year Edward 
complained to Philip le Bel of France that "Merchants were not per- 
mitted to bring any kind of money out of France into England, for 
that it was taken from them by searchers." When it is remembered 
that the coins of Philip le Bel were greatly debased and overvalued, 
it appears more likely that the clipped and "foreign" counterfeit 
coins, mentioned in the proclamation, were fabricated in England. 
This view finds further corroboration in the fact that in 1318 "anas- 
say was made of the money minted in the exchanges of London and 
Canterbury ... to wit, of £^0, 730 minted in the said exchanges within 
the said time " (about two years) and " upon this assay, it was found 
that the said money was too weak and of a greater alloy than it ought 
to have been by ^258:5:10." " 

The classification of bullion into domestic and foreign, first occurs 
in the reign of Edward II. , and was continued in that of Edward III. , 
after which no traces of it appear in the mint records. Nature does 
not admit of such classification, because all bullion of the like metal 

'^Madox, I, 386. i^Iadox, I, 294. Statutes at Large.vol.i. ''' Madox, i, 291. 



338 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

and when refined, is alike. Domestic metal cannot be distinguished 
from foreign. It was clearly impracticable to prevent foreign bullion 
from being imported, indeed the complaint of the times was that for- 
eign clipped and counterfeit coins were imported; and if practically 
coins could be imported, so also could bullion. Nor was it the policy 
of the crown to prevent the importation of bullion; on the contrary, it 
did everything in its power to promote such importation." It is there- 
fore difficult to see what object was aimed at by classifying silver into 
cismarinum and transmarinum, " except a further assertion of that 
newly-acquired imperial prerogative of entire control over the coin- 
age and the materials of coinage, which the king had in his mind, and 
seemed determined to proclaim to all the world. Whatever his plans, 
they were defeated by the rebellion of his wife Isabella and the nobles 
whom he had previously curbed and restrained. These, fleeing to 
France with the infant son of the king, there organized an expedition, 
which landed in England during the autumn of 1326, defeated and 
captured the king threw him into a dungeon,and there dispatched him. 

Edward III. was crowned January 25th, 1327. To the numerous 
and sudden alterations of money, which, like an exhibition of fire- 
works, celebrate the emancipation of the western princes from the 
thraldom of Caesar's Empire, but introduced the greatest confusion 
into nummulary denominations and relations, England contributed an 
additional element of confusion. At all events it was far less common 
in other countries. This was the marked difference between the con- 
tents of a coin as provided by law or mint indenture and its actual 
contents as found by weight and assay of perfect specimens still ex- 
tant. For example, the mint indenture of 1345 provided that the 
pound Tower of silver 0.925 fine, should be coined into 22}^ pennies. 
This would make the gross weight of each penny 24 grains and the 
contents of fine silver 22.2 grains; whereas, the actual coins, in good 
condition, weigh but 20 grains and contain but 18^ grains of fine silver. 
Similar differences are to be found in other coins of the period. 

In choosing between the conflicting evidences' of the statutes, the 
mint indentures, and the actual coins, the author has observed the 
following order of preference : first, the actual coins ; second, the mint- 
indentures; third, the acts of parliament, which in many instances 
were only intended for show or deception, and in such case were prac- 
tically dead letter. Even in the actual coins there is room for error; 
because they vary considerably. Mr. Keary's weighings are those of 
the heaviest ; and because this practice is regarded as misleading, we 

'5 Ruding. 



GRADUAL DEVELOPMENT OF ENGLISH NATIONALITY. 339 

have not always been guided by that author. Among the earliest stat- 
utes of the new reign were those of 1327 against the importing of 
light and counterfeit coins, and of 1331, against the exportation of 
either coins or bullion. The penalty for the latter was at first made 
death, and the forfeiture of all the offender's profit; but two years 
aftervv^ards it was lessened by proclamation to mere forfeiture of the 
money so attempted to be exported, and in 1335 the act was extended 
to ' ' religious men, " as well as others. The conviction which must en- 
force itself upon all persons in authority, that such ordinances can 
never be practically executed, the actual failure of similar ordinances 
in the preceding reign, and the language and tone of the present ones, 
all combine to produce the impression that the latter were intended 
as a cover, to account for the melting down of the "old sterlings" 
in the king's mints, and to furnish an apology for that emission of 
Black Money which soon afterwards made its appearance and was 
probably fabricated at the king's behest. That he was not above the 
art of issuing insincere edicts is strikingly proved by his proclama- 
tion of 1341, wherein he avows that in his previous Interdict of Usury 
he "dissembled in the premises," and " suffered that pretended stat- 
ute to be sealed," which he now revokes and declares void.'° 

Dr. Ruding naively enquires if the Turonensis nigri, mentioned in 
the statute of 1335, as being "commonly current in our (the king's) 
realm," meant copper coins struck at Tours. We think not. There 
are no proofs that copper coins of Tours circulated in England at this 
period, but many proofs that English black money did ; for in the same 
statute it was provided that all manner of black money actually in 
circulation should cease to be current in one month's time after it is 
decried. " Yet,but a short time afterwards, the king's council in parlia- 
ment at York, authorized new black money to be made, containing one- 
sixth part of alloy. '* In 1338 various proclamations were made which 
denote that black money was still in circulation ; and in 1339 one was 
made which authorized the circulation of black " turneys " (tournois) 
in Ireland." Black money was not peculiar to Edward III., but had 
been used by both his father and his grandfather. Edward I. , in 1 293, 
agreed to pay to the emperor Adolphus 300,000 "black livres tour- 

'® Statutes at Large; Ruding, 11, 251. 

" "All manner of Black Money which hath been commonly current of late in our 
realm " shall cease to be current within a month after it is decried. Statutes at Large, 

9 Edward IIL, 1335. 

'* A great part of this statute is not printed in the modern editions of the Statutes 
at Large. Consult 9 Edward III., in Statutes, folio ed., 1577, black letter. 

'»C1. 13 Edward III., pt. 2, 35 dors. Rymer, " Fcedera," v, 113. 



34° THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

nois," and in 1297, to certain nobles of Burgundy, 30,000 " small black 
livres tournois. " ^'' To the earl of Guelders Edward promised to pay 
100,000 "black livres tournois, "" and it is not likely that at this 
period he would have stipulated, or the others accepted his stipulations, 
to pay so large a sum, in a coin which he did not himself fabricate. 

In the royal ordinance authorizing the establishment of a mint at 
Calais, after the capture of that city in 1347, the king, Edward III,, 
commanded White Money to be made there similar to that which was 
struck in England." In 1354 the moneyers of Aquitain were allowed 
3^. in the mark, for all money coined by them, for the king, whether 
' ' white or black, " except gold. " We repeat that these black moneys, 
which the historians usually evince much anxiety to keep out of view, 
are really the proofs of England's dawning independence; for while 
she remained a fief of Rome and while the mints of the Basileus supplied 
her with besants, nobody was obliged to use silver, and the fabrication 
of black money would have brought the king no profit; and therefore 
none was coined. The coinage of black money and the abrogation of 
the Sacred besant, mean the same thing: the refusal and rejection of 
any further allegiance to the Empire. 

In 1 341 a great mass of sterling coins and silver-plate was collected 
in London by private parties, for exportation. In 1342 a similar event 
occurred at Boston. " It is difficult to see the motive for these attempts 
to export silver, unless the circulation consisted of royal money, over- 
valued, and unless there was no further use for sterlings and silver 
bullion in the hands of private owners. In 1342 the king's rents in 
Guernsey, Jersey, Sark, and Alderney, were exacted in sterlings, while 
his payments were made in light coins, worth but ten shillings in the 
" pound. "^^ This may have been clipped coins or black money, of 
which each penny piece had but a half-penny's worth of silver in it, 
and therefore the nominal "pound," but ten shillings' worth. 

In 1343 the council in parliament advised the king to issue what 
would now be termed a Convention, or international gold coin, to be 
current, with permission of the Flemings, both in Flanders and Eng- 
land ; that no silver should be carried out of the realm except by noble- 
men ; and that these should be limited to the carrying out of silver-plate 
for use in their establishments. The first part of this proposal intro- 
duces one of the most important subjects connected with the regalian 

'•'"Anderson's " History of Commerce," i, 250; "Foedera," 778, 

-'Anderson, I, 251; Rymer's " Fcedera," v, 675, 

*^ Rot, France, 22 Edward III., m. ig; Ruding, 11, i82«, 

^* Rot. Vase, 28 Edward III., m. i; Ruding, 11, 195. 

'* Ruding. 11, 150-2, "Ruding, 11, 152. 



GRADUAL DEVELOPMENT OV ENGLISH NATIONALITY. 341 

rights of the English crown. Down to the year 1204, or, practically, 
to 1257, the gold coins lawfully circulating in England had been sup- 
plied exclusively by the Basileus, and consisted, as before stated, of 
the besant and its fractions. When in that year Henry resolved to 
invade the prerogative of the Sacred empire, he struck, not a solidus, 
nor a fraction of a solidus, but a Moorish maravedi, a piece which com- 
merce with the Spanish-Arabians had rendered familiar to English- 
men under the various names of maravedi, new talent, obolusde Murcia, 
gold penny, etc. The maravedi of that period contained 40 to 43 
grains of fine gold. It circulated in England, not like the besant, by 
force of law and immemorial usage, but merely because it was a justly 
minted and well-known coin of regular weight and fineness and pre- 
ferable to the adulterated and clipped coins which had made their 
appearance when the besants began to disappear in the reign of John. 
The maravedi had filled the circulation in continually increasing pro- 
portions. Its low valuation in silver, 10 for i, proves that it had no 
standing in the law. As the common circulation of the maravedi in 
England may seem incredible to a certain class of numismatists, it has 
been deemed useful to bring together some of the texts in which it is 
mentioned. It will be seen at a glance that its sera agrees substantially 
with that of the Plantagenet dynasty. 

Table showing the texts which mention the Maravedi, or Obolus de Murcia, as 

circulating in Englatid. 
Year. Reign. Remarks. 

I176 23 Henry II. Madox, 11, 367, valued at 20 sterlings. 

I193 5 Richard I. Madox, 1, 278, valued at 10 for i. 

1215 17 John. Madox, I, 261, valued at 21 sterlings. 

1250 35 Henry III. Madox, in the case of Philip Lurel. 

1252 37 Henry III. Ruding, I, 316, valued at 16 sterlings." 

1257 41 Henry III. Weight 4 1>^ grains fine, coined by the king, valued at 20 sterlings. 

1269 53 Henry III. Same coin, valued at 24 sterlings. 

1283 12 Edward I. Madox, 

1293 22 Edward I. Madox. 

1347 21 Edward III. Mixt Moneys Case. Davis' Reports. 

"^^ From Henshaw's translation of Domesday Book, vol. i, fol. i. The pence were 
light ones. 

The Maravedi was first coined in Spain during the dynasty of the 
Almoravedes, hence its name. One of these coins, struck in Murcia 
A. H. 548, (A. D. 1 153,) during the interregnum between the Almora- 
vede and Almohade dynasties, is called by Queipo a " Mourdanish," 
which we are inclined to believe is a misnomer. One of these pieces, 
in a very good state of preservation, is now in the cabinet of Gayanos, 
and weighs 44^^ English grains. It tallies in weight with the siliqua 
weight or the 120th part of the Egypto-Roman pound of 5243^ Eng- 
lish grains, with the gold maravedi, with the silver dirhem, and with 



342 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

two Sterling pennies." The true Mourdanish should rather be found 
in the half-mithcal, a specimen of which, struck during the first years 
of the Almohade dynasty, is now in the cabinet of Cerda. This coin 
is also published by Queipo, who accords it its true name, the " mour- 
danish of Murcia," and gives its weight at 34^ grains, the state of 
conservation being very good. The use of the gold mithcal of Spain 
can be traced back to the eighth century, when Hakem I. , settled upon 
his brother, Suleiman, a life annnity of 70,000 "mithcales, or pesan- 
tes,"as an equivalent for his estates in Spain. ^* In the tenth century 
the mithcal was called by the Christians the " dobla," probably in ref- 
erence to its being the double of the more popular and better known 
half-mithcal, or "mourdanish.""^ Abd-el-Raman III., 912-61, settled 
a life annuity of 100,000 " doblas of gold " upon Ahmed-ben-Saia, for 
his capture and plunder of Tunis. ^° The annual revenvues of Al Hakem 
II.,besides the taxes in kind, were "twelve million mithcals of gold."" 
The piece we are considering is therefore not the half-mithcal, but the 
maravedi; and its period is notthat of the early,but of the later caliphs 
of Spain, the contemporaries of the Plantagenets. 

The weight of Henry's gold coins was 43 grains 0.965 fine, equal 
to about 41 >^ grains fine. They were probably intended to weigh ex- 
actly the same as one gold maravedi, or two silver sterlings. These 
coins he called "oboli " and ordered them to pass for twenty silver 
sterlings (or half-dirhems), a ratio apparently of 10 for i, but really 
of 9 for I, because his sterlings weighed less than 20 grains and were 
only 0.925 fine. It is alleged that these gold coins were objected to 
on commercial grounds, by the merchants of London. This is hardly 
credible, because the coins were really undervalued. They could be 
bought with 9 weights of pure silver, whereas they were worth twelve, 
which was the universal ratio of the times,in all Christian states. This 
conclusion is strengthened by the circumstance that these same ' 'oboli" 
after being temporarily demonetized, were raised by Henry's com- 
mand, in 1269, to 24 pence, a ratio of 12, and that at this ratio they 
actually passed current without objection. As to their mechanical 
execution, the author is able, from personal examination, to declare 
that they were far superior to any other coins, English or French, of 

^'' The siliqua weight must not be confused with the siliqua coin, which weighed 
scarcely more than a third as much. ^^ Calcott, i, 139. 

^^ The contents of the dobla de la vanda in " Money and Civilization," p. 93, deduced 
from the assumption that the castellano coin was as heavy as the castellano weight, are 
given erroneously. The " dobla " of the period mentioned in the text was in facta heavy 
dinar. At a later period it was the double maravedi; hence its name. 

2" Calcott, I, 223. 3' Calcott, i, 249. 



GRADUAL DEVELOPMENT OF ENGLISH NATIONALITY. 343 

that day. The only valid reason that can be assigned for the objec- 
tion made to them was the superstitious repugnance to accept gold 
coins not stamped with the authority of the Sacred empire. This re- 
pugnance may have been enhanced by the fear that the coins would 
not be currently accepted in England, or if in England, not in other 
Christian states. 

Bearing in mind the example and failure of Henry III., Edward did 
not venture to strike coins of gold until he had acquired that full de- 
gree of sovereignty which the Basileus had involuntarily bequeathed 
to the western princes. In November, 1337, Edward was appointed 
and he accepted the appointment of Vicar-General to the German 
emperor, with power to coin money of gold and silver. Though this 
formality now seemed needless, yet that it was entered into with the 
view to prepare the way for the coinage of gold, is evident from sev- 
eral circumstances. In 1340 the king's council in parliament enacted 
that all shippers of wool should undertake to bring in for each bag 
two marks worth of gold or silver. ^^ Again in 1342, the king ordered, 
still more pointedly, that all corn exported to foreign countries should 
be sold for gold coins or bullion. Another preparation, a futile one 
to be sure, consisted in employing Raymond Lully, or some other 
alchemist, for whom a laboratory was fitted up in the Tower, which 
should enable that impostor to transmute gold from baser metals. Was 
it an excess of caution, lest the great step he meditated might mis- 
carry at the last moment, that the king found a means to prompt the 
advice of his council in parliament that he should coin gold? At all 
events such seems to be the meaning of the insinuation that the 
Flemings sold their goods only for Flemish gold florins, which were 
so highly overvalued in English silver coins, as to render payment 
in the latter unprofitable to English merchants. In other words, said 
the king, by paying gold florins with silver coins, our merchants con- 
tinually lose; let us therefore enable them to pay in gold ones. 

Such appears to have been the genesis of the famous ordinance of 
1343, Upon the king's information, the king's council advised the 
king, (provided the Flemings were willing,) to issue an international 
gold coin ; and it was provided in such event that such coins should be 
unlimited legal-tenders between merchant and merchant, "as money 
not to be refused; " that all other persons, great or small, might ac- 
cept them if they pleased; but not otherwise; that all other (foreign) 
gold coins should be melted down; and that no silver should be car- 
ried out of the realm except by noblemen, and then, only silver-plate 

*^ Ruding, 149. 



344 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

for use in their establishments. This advice was carried into effect 
in 1344 by the coinage of a gold double-florin, weighing 50 to the 
pound Tower, of 23^ carats, 0.979 fine, the "old standard" forgold.'' 
Thus each piece would contain 105^ grains, fine. It was ordered to 
be current at six shillings (each of 12 sterlings). Two or three speci- 
mens of this piece are extant, both found in the river Tyne. The 
best one weighs 107 grains, gross. There were also florins and half- 
florins of the same issue, now extremely rare. At first and differing 
from the advice of the council in parliament, the double-florins were 
made full legal-tenders in " all manner of payments," afterwards op- 
tional legal-tenders; and finally, they were demonetized, all within the 
same year. They were the first English coins of any kind upon which 
were stamped the words, dei gratia." Down to that time the kings 
of England coined by the grace of Csesar, or, as in John's case, the 
Pope, his successor. Edward III. first coined by the grace of God. 

Previous to 1344 the sterlings of Edward III., '^ contained 20^ 
grains, 0.925 fine, equal to 19^ grains fine silver. Hence the ratio 
between the double-florin and the sterling or silver penny was about 
12.6 for i; too high for gold and too low for silver. As the Flemings 
were evidently unwilling to accept gold at this valuation and the 
double-florins found no welcome with the merchants, the king, bent 
upon the successful issuance of this significant proclamation and token 
of national independence, ordered a new gold coin to be struck ; where- 
upon he decried the first one. The second issue, which was made in 
the same year as the first, was of nobles, weighing 39^ to the pound 
Tower, same fineness as the double-florins, hence containing 133.8 
grains, fine, and valued at six shillings and eight-pence; a ratio of 11.06 
for I. These were made legal-tender for all sums of twenty shillings 
and upwards, but not for any sum below. The obverse of this coin 
represents the king standing in a ship in mid-channel, obviously in 
allusion to its international character. Some of the numismatists, 
however, make it typify the strength of the English navy in 1359, 
fifteen years after date; others, a victory over corsairs, in 1347, three 
years after; and others, a naval victory over the French in 1340, four 
years before. Mr. Keary gives the weight of an extant noble of this 
issue at 138^ grains, standard. This is evidently exceptionally heavy. 

^^ As this was the first issue of gold coins by any Christian king in England, or any 
king of all England, except the abortive maravedisof Henry III., the expression "old 
standard" in the mint indenture could only refer to the Byzantine or the Arabian standard. 
The former was about 0.900, the latter was 0.979 fine (23^ carats). Therefore " old 
standard " in reference to gold meant the Arabian or sterling standard. 

^*Ruding, II, 212. 36 "Old Sterlings." Lowndes. 



GRADUAL DEVELOPMENT OF ENGLISH NATIONALITY. 345 

He also gives the weight of the later issues of 1346 at 128 5-7 grains, 
standard, and the still later ones of 135 1 to 1360, at 120 grains, stand- 
ard ; the legal value being always 6s. 8d., or half a mark. The king's 
seigniorage upon these coins was ^i for each one pound Tower weight 
of gold, and the charge of the Master of the Mint was t,s. 4^., to- 
gether ^i .-3:4. As the Tower pound weight was coined into ^^13:3:4 
of account, the merchant received back but ;^i2, or scarcely more 
than 91 per cent., of the gold deposited at the mint. In the follow- 
ing year the merchant's proportion of the ^13:3:4 coined out of his 
pound weight of gold, was raised from ^12 10^12:13:4; thus leav- 
ing to the crown and mint only 4 per cent.'" 

When the crown came to deal with the Flemings it found that people 
less compliant than it had wished. They agreed to accept gold nobles 
to be coined under the king's authority in Flanders, provided they 
could agree upon a proper division of the profits from the coinage." 
To determine this proportion and superintend the issuance of the 
coins, commissioners were sent to Ghent, Bruges, and Ipre, but the 
result of the negotiations is not definitively known. Froissart and 
Grafton both state that Edward struck gold coins at Antwerp in 1337, 
none of which are extant, and it may be the same with the Anglo- 
Flemish gold coins proposed in 1344. In a mint-indenture of 1345 
the weight of the noble was reduced. The pound Tower of gold, 23 jE^ 
carats fine, was to be coined into 42 nobles, each valued at 80 sterl- 
ings. In 135 1 the noble was reduced to 120 grains standard, without 
alteration of nominal value, which continued as before, at 6s. 8d. 

One thing more. This coin convention with the Flemings is the 
earliest, or among the earliest, international monetary treaties known 
in history,since the establishment of the Sacred empire. If the "king- 
doms" of France, Spain, Portugal, England, Burgundy, etc., were as 
independent as the modern historians of those countries would fain 
pretend, why is it that they have not been able to produce the evi- 
dence of any international conventions or treaties between them pre- 
vious to the Fall of Constantinople, and why is it that such conven- 
tions took place immediately after that event and have continued at 
intervals to take place down to the present day? 

This completes our numismatic evidences. The view that has herein 
been asserted with respect to the constitution of the Roman empire 

^* Ruding, II, 165, 174. 

^' Ruding, II, 194. The Flemish ratio of the time was evidently lofori; therefore, 
to warrant the acceptance of the gold nobles in Flanders at Edward's valuation, the 
Plemings must have been obliged to demand the entire abandonment of the seigniorage, 
to which, of course, the English commissioners would not assent. 



346 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

and its relations to England, run contrary to the entire stream of his- 
tory, as depicted in the pages of popular writers; and it had to be sup- 
ported by a strong array of proofs. Down to the issuance of the 
gold nobles, the monetary systems of the English monarchy belonged 
to the Empire, they conserved no local or national principles, they 
contained no lessons for Englishmen. But from this moment they 
assume an entirely different phase and bearing, they become imbued 
with life, they partake of the spirit which had begun to animate the 
nation to which they belong, they occupy a distinct position in the 
British Constitution, and they bear upon them the marks of those end- 
less struggles and vicissitudes through which the Anglo-Saxon races 
have borne the standard of religious and political liberty. 

To those to whom the ratio of value between the precious metals 
appears due to any other circumstance than the arbitrary laws of na- 
tional mints, or to those whose attention to the history of this recon- 
dite subject has now been drawn for the first time, the ratio may seem 
a strange or inadequate criterion of political or religious domina- 
tion. But it is precisely in such obscure relations between great and 
little things, that an Allwise Creator has sheltered the truth of his- 
tory from man's destructive powers. The forgery of books, the de- 
facement of monuments, the perversion of evidences, the extermination 
.of non-conformists, the invention of fabulous cosmogonies and super- 
stitious fictions, all are made in vain to conceal or crush the Truth, 
so long as a blade of grass or a breath of air remains on earth to re- 
veal it; for all Nature is united in a mysterious harmony, and to even 
approximately master one branch of science is to gain a key, which, 
with patience and industry, may eventually unlock for us all the others. 



347 



CHAPTER XX. 



VASSAL KINGS OF ENGLAND. 



Previous to 1204 the Kings of England were vassals to Byzantium — Afterwards they 
were vassals to Rome — Examples from the Papal Registers — From Matthew Paris — 
From other sources. 

THE vassalage of the European princes to the Roman Empire has 
been shown in previous chapters; their vassalage to the See 
of Rome, after the Fall of Constantinople, will form the especial 
subject of the present chapter. 

In the " Calendar of entries in the Papal Registers relating to Great 
Britain and Ireland," published in 1893 by Mr. W. H. Bliss, appear 
numerous mandates from the Papal See to both the Norman and Plan- 
tagenet kings of England, the nature of which clearly proves them to 
have been vassals of Rome. Under the year 1201-2 appears a "Letter 
from Otho, emperor-elect of the Romans, to the pope, informing him 
that the king of England (John) is bound to give help to the Emperor 
against all enemies, and to make peace with France, as he himself is 
bound by order of the pope, whom he thanks, next to God, for his 
promotion." 

The following passages are all from the English edition of Matthew 
Paris: 

In A. D. 1 236, Henry III. declared to an assemblage of his nobles at 
Winchester, that the pope alone had the authority to grant and annul 
rights in his kingdom. Vol. i, p. 34. In 1237, the king "declared 
that he could not arrange any business of the kingdom, make any al- 
terations or alienations, without the consent of his Lord the pope, or 
the legate, (Otto,) so that he might be said to be not a king, but a 
vassal of the pope. " p. 68. In the same year, the legate, Otto, ' ' whose 
footsteps the king worshipped," announced at St. Paul's that he had 
been sent by the Papal See as legate ' ' to iheprovince of England. " p. 69. 

In 1238, the king of England sent a body of troops, under the com- 
mand of Henry de Trubleville, to assist the Emperor against his rebel- 
lious subjects in the Italian provinces, p. 129. " The Emperor having 



34^ THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

continued the siege of Milan, almost all the Christian princes sent him 
auxiliary troops. " p. 133. In 1239, the Emperor (Frederick II.) said; 
"I have sworn, as the world well knows, to recover the scattered por- 
tions of the Empire." p. 163. In 1239, the Emperor, (Frederick II.,) 
replying to pope Gregory, declared that the taxes demanded by the 
imperial ofificers from ecclesiastics were not upon the property of the 
church, but for feudal and patrimonial dues, "according to the com- 
mon law, (of Rome,) and this is in force in all parts of the world." 
p. 185. In 1239, the Emperor declared, in a letter to the western 
princes, that the pope's conduct was alienating "the nations" from 
"the Imperial sceptre." p. 191. 

In 1239, the pope, writing to the Emperor Otto, declared that the 
Pontificate had raised the Emperor to ' ' the summit of secular power, " 
and that in such position he was "its vassal." p. 197. In 1239, the 
Emperor wrote to his brother-in-law, Richard, earl of Cornwall, con- 
cerning the pope : ' ' For the humiliation of all other kings and princes 
becomes an easy matter, when the power of the Csesars of the Romans 
is first overthrown," and that the pope had violated his agreement to 
"apply to Our uses, the tithes of the whole world." p. 212. In 1239, 
the pope identifies as one " the Empire and the whole Christian com- 
munity." p. 225. In 1239, the pope sent letters to "all the prelates 
and nobles dwelling in Germany and other parts of the Empire. " p. 239. 

In 1239, when Gregory " condemned and cut off the so-called Em- 
peror Frederick from the imperial dignity and elected count Robert, 
brother of the French king, in his stead," the French king replied that 
Frederick " could not be deprived of his crown, unless by a decision 
of a General Council." p. 242. In 1240, king Henry III. admitted, in 
writing to the Emperor concerning himself, the king, that "he was 
a tributary or vassal of the pope. " p. 257. In the same year Frederick 
reproached Henry with permitting the pope "to boast that he has the 
power of a liege Lord over you " ; and Henry replied that "he did not 
dare to oppose the pope." p. 268. 

On the first day (Christmas) of the year 1241, the king (Henry) 
seated the pope's legate in his own royal seat at table, and sat on the 
legate's right hand. p. 318. In 1241, the Emperor wrote to the king 
of England and the other princes of the Roman Empire, attributing 
the Tartar invasion to the dissentions produced by the intrigues of 
the Pontificate, and entreated them to sustain, " the victorious eagles 
of the potent European Empire," exhorting Germany, France, Spain, 
England, Almaine, Dacia, Italy, Burgundy, Apulia, Ireland, Scotland, 
Norway, the Islands of the Sea, "and every noble and renowned coun- 



VASSAL KINGS OF ENGLAND. 349 

try lying within the Royal Star of the West," to rally to the defense 
of the Empire, p. 347. In 1241, Frederick wrote to King Henry that 
God had ' ' decreed that the Machine of the World is to be governed, 
not alone by the priesthood, but by sovereignty and priesthood to- 
gether." p. 355. In 1244, Frederick drove the Tartars out of Hun- 
gary, and in turn received the homage of the king of Hungary, who 
was bound to supply the Empire with "300 knights and their followers, 
to fight on the borders for the Emperor, loyally and faithfully. " p. 490. 
In 1244, Frederick, writing to Richard, earl of Cornwall, terms his 
dominions "the Sacred Empire," and himself "our Magnificence," 
and repeats instructions " to you and the other kings and princes of 
Christendom." p. 494. 

In 1 244, David, ' ' prince of Wales, a petty vassal of the king of Eng- 
land . . . wishing to free his neck from the yoke of allegiance to the 
king, fled to the papal wings for protection, promising to hold that 
part of Wales which belonged to him, from the pope himself. The 
pope, in consequence, favored his cause," and accepted his presents 
and tribute, p. 511. In 1245, the pope ordered the abbots of Aber- 
conway and Kemere to enquire into the matter, and, if deemed ex- 
pedient, to release the prince of Wales from his oath of fidelity to the 
king of England. These instructions having been shown to Henry, 
he renewed the war against David. " When the pope heard of this, 
he winked at and concealed it all, but did not, however, restore to 
David the presents he had received from him." Vol. 11, 39. 

In 1245, the pope declared: " We have determined to convoke the 
kings of the earth, the prelates of the churches, and other magnates 
of the world in general," to a council, p. 49. In 1245, at the Council 
of Lyons, which was attended by delegates from the king of England, 
the pope, (Innocent,) excommunicated the Emperor Frederick, be- 
cause, among other offenses, "he has omitted for nine years and 
more to pay the annual pension of a thousand sequins, in which he 
is bound to the Roman church, for the tenure of the said kingdom." 
pp. 85, 148. In 1245, the pope attempted to bribe the electors with 
"15,000 pounds of silver," to elect anew Emperor; but the scheme was 
defeated by Frederick, p. 95. Said Frederick, of the pope, in 1245, in 
acircularletter to the kingsof the West, " Does his vulgar pride toss 
him to such heights as to enable him to hurl from the Imperial dignity, 
Me, the chief Prince of the World, than whom none is greater, yea, 
who am without an equal?" p. 103, 

There has been adduced no evidence that any of the kings thus 
addressed denied the claim of suzerainty made by the Emperor. 



35° THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

In 1245, the Emperor wrote to the king of England and the other 
Western princes: "What will there not remain for each of you 
kings of each kingdom to fear, from the face of such a prince of 
priests, (the pope,) if he attempts to depose Us, who have been hon- 
oured, as it were, from Heaven, with the Imperial diadem, by the 
solemn election of princes, and with the approbation of the whole 
church?" p. 105. Also: " We will give you further information more 
secretly how we propose to arrange concerning the affairs of kings in 
general and of each one in particular." p. 106. In 1245, "the pope, 
with a patient mind and the eyes of connivance, dissemblingly passed 
by all these things, " and instructed all the bishops of England to affix 
their seals of attestation to the charter by which, half a century pre- 
viously, king John had acknowledged his kingdom a fief of the Pont- 
ificate and had agreed to pay it tribute, p. no. 

In 1245, the bishop of Beyrout came to England, with authority 
from the pope to preach a crusade and collect money, on being shown 
which authority, the king replied that ' 'we have been so often deceived 
by the Roman court," that "you will scarcely find anyone who will 
put faith in you." p. 117. In 1246, it was rumoured that upon the 
hearing of this, the pope declared that when he had subdued the Em- 
peror Frederick, " he would afterwards tread down the insolent pride 
of the English." p. 129. In 1246, at a Parliament held in London, 
the king read to the earls, barons, abbots, and priors, then present, 
an address ' in which the grievances, tyrannies, oppressions, and ex- 
tortions, of the pope, were set forth at length, and upon this it was 
unanimously resolved that the spiritual lords should petition his Holi- 
ness to abate his '' insupportable yoke." p. 148. A similar petition 
was addressed to the pope by the temporal lords, claiming to repre- 
sent themselves and the inferior clergy and ' ' people in general. " p. 150. 
And a similar petition by the king. p. 155. And still another petition 
setting forth that the knights' service and military service, horses, and 
arms, demanded for the service of the Roman See, was an unendurable 
burden, p. 156. All these complaints were treated by the pope with 
contempt, p. 175. 

In 1246, Frederick complained to the nobles of England that the 
pope had unwarrantably put him under the ban of the law," who is, 
by his Imperial rank, freed from all law, in whom temporal punish- 
ments ought to be inflicted, not by man, but by God, as he has no 
superior amongst men." p. 161. Hecontinues: "It commences indeed 

' This address, given at length by Matthew Paris, constitutes a veritable Declaration 
of Independence; and is a much more interesting document than Magna Charta. 



VASSAL KINGS OF ENGLAND. 35 I 

with Us, but rest assured it will continue with other kings and princes, 
if Our sovereignty can be trodden under foot in the first place." p. 162. 
In i246,thecount of Savoy paid homage to the king of England, "with- 
out violating his faith, or injuring the Emperor or the Empire." p. 167. 
In the same year, the Holy See, having ordered that " if any clerk 
should die intestate, his property should be converted to the use of 
the pope," the king "forbade the decree being fulfilled; the first 
instance of insubordination on his part." p. 169. The king also for- 
bade the payment of talliages to the pope, until the reply of the latter 
was received, p. 170. Notwithstanding this, the pope " made a most 
urgent demand for money, placing his confidence in gold and silver, 
treating with contempt the mournful complaints of the king of Eng- 
land and the whole community. " p. 170. Frederick declared that "the 
Roman Church had never such effectual grounds for extorting money 
from the Christians, on which it had fattened and grown proud, as on 
the pretense of the Holy Land and the sophistical preaching of crus- 
ades for its liberation." p. 174. In spite of all this, king Henry suc- 
cumbed to the authority of the pope ; ' ' hence all the endeavours of the 
nobles, as well as of the bishops, were of no avail, and all hope oi the 
freedom of the kingdom, and of the English church, died away. " p. 176. 

The pope ordered that the gains of usurers and of all persons dying 
intestate," which had been acquired by usury," or by malpractices, 
or which was " rightly due to others," and the property of all persons 
living "which had been evilly acquired," should be collected "for 
the benefit of the Empire of Constantinople," which was now under 
the control of the Holy See. p. 179. Matthew Paris accuses Richard, 
earl of Cornwall, of serving the pope, ' ' to the ruin of the English king- 
dom and the detriment of the Empire." p. 189. " The notaries and 
accountants of the Roman court yield like wax to bribery and hire." 
p. 207. In 1247, "some adhered to Frederick as if to the Empire, and 
others to the pope, as if to the church." p. 235. 

In 1248, the pope, in a conference with the French king at Lyons, 
alluded to " the king of England, our vassal." p. 268. In 1249, Henry, 
king of England, "was forbidden by Master Albert, in the name of 
the pope, to attack in any way, whatever, any territory held under 
any title by the king of France." pp. 290, 527. It was believed that 
" the pope eagerly desired, above all things, to overthrow Frederick, 
in order that he might more easily trample down the French and Eng- 
lish kings and other kings of Christendom, all of whom he called petty 
princes and little serpents. " p. 328. In 1250, the king of England hav- 
ing complained to the pope that the bishops of England had assumed 



352 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

command of his sheriffs and bailiffs, pope Innocent IV. ordered the 
bishops to refrain from such meddling, p. 337. 

It is submitted that these passages afford ample proof of the asser- 
tion that down to the reign of Henry III., the king of England was 
not a sovereign, but was a vassal, either of the pope or the Emperor. 

Nothing is easier than to write history upon familiar or accepted 
lines: nothing is easier than to float with the tide. Every bit of idle 
flotsam impels the voyager on his way and guards him from hostile 
approach. On the contrary, nothing is more difficult than to write 
history upon unfamiliar or objectionable lines. The friendly flotsam 
are now turned to snags and rocks which, one by one, have to be 
pushed aside or destroyed, if the adventurer is to survive and carry 
his reader safely into port. Every step upon such a course is a struggle ; 
every line a field of dispute; every misplaced word or turned letter, 
a fresh proof of the writer's ignorance or incapacity. 

In bringing forward the^palateable proofs of England's subordi- 
nancy to the Roman EmpirCj something more is implied than the poli- 
tical status of an ancient kingdom, concerning which, only the jurist 
and historical student might possess a., practical interest. Among 
other things, it throws some doubt upon t"he validity of certain Titles 
of Honour, which their present wearers pretend to have derived from 
kings whom it is herein shown had no authority to grant them. Not- 
withstanding the resentment which this may occasion, the truth must 
be told, and the truth appears to be that, down to the reign of the Plan- 
tagenet Kings, England was not an independent sovereign kingdom. 



353 



CHAPTER XXI. 

BIRTH OF THE INDEPENDENT MONARCHY. 

Impetus afforded to the development of national independence by the Great Inter- 
regnum — Assertions of English national authority — Suppression of Roman tribunals 
— Discouragement of Roman benefices — Statute of premunire — Establishment of 
English national law — Of the House of Commons — Of the English language in the 
courts — Royal assumption cf the right to charter trade-guilds — Assumption of national 
control over the precious metals and money — Assumption of Mines-Royal — Assump- 
tion of treasure-trove — Royal coinage of gold — Interdict of the besant — Trial of the 
Pix — Royal monetary commission — Suppression of episcopal and baronial mints — 
Export of precious metals prohibited — First complete national sovereignty of money 
— Prohibition of tribute to Rome — Conclusion. 

GREAT events do not occur alone. They appear neither unher- 
alded nor unsung. Minor facts presage them; others proclaim 
their existence; still others crowed about them to exalt their greatness; 
and a long heritage remains to chronicle them and attest them. The 
independence of England was not an isolated event. It was preceded, 
accompanied and followed by numerous others, some of which fore- 
told its coming, while others commemorated its occurrence. Among 
the former class was the coinage of gold by Henry III. This act pro- 
claimed an assumption of sovereign power which Henry's weak and 
faithless character was not fitted to support, either by moral courage 
or force of arms. It bears the same relation to England's Declaration 
of Independence as the coinage of Pine-Tree shillings did to that of 
America. It was the trumpet sound of a coming event ; not the event 
itself. The latter was marked by the magnificent gold coinage of j 
1344, upon which Edward is pourtrayed with a drawn sword and \iy^ 
standing on the deck of a man-of-ra^, asserting his readiness to j 
defend the new born liberties of his country, if necessary, againsfc' 
the world. 

The interval between the coinages of Henry and Edward was filled 
with significant events. Prominent among these was that Great In- 
terregnum ' which marked the fall of the Medieval German empire 

* The name given to the interval between the death of Frederick II., and the accept- 
ance of the so-called imperial crown by Rudolph of Hapsburg, in 1273. 



354 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

and the dissolution of that partnership of Cunning and Ambition which 
had joined the intrigues of Leo III. to the dripping swords of Pepin 
and Charlemagne. Frederick II. died in 1 250, and as Mr. Bryce pithily 
remarks, "with Frederick, fell the empire." The brief and eventless 
reign of Conrad IV., and the assassination of Conradin by the con- 
nivance and with the approval of Pope Clement, ended the Suabian 
line of "emperors, "but furnished no basis for a new dynasty. In vain 
did the See of Rome urge Richard of Cornwall, Alfonso of Castile, 
and others, to fill its now puppet-throne of empire. In vain did it 
urge upon the western princes the necessity of choosing an ' * imperial" 
sovereign. It met with nothing but respectful apathy. Edward was 
not the only prince who during or shortly after the Interregnum drew 
an independent national sword. The Church had extinguished both 
the Basileus and the " Emperor"; there was no longer any empire, 
neither Sacred, nor Holy, neither eastern, nor western. The edifice 
which Csesar had erected had often given way and had been as often 
propped up, patched and repaired. This time it went to pieces, and 
many of these pieces disappeared in the void of the Interregnum. The 
pope remained master of the field, but the field was now a desert, in 
which he stood alone, abandoned by all the world. The princes of 
Europe, the proconsuls, dukes and kings of the Roman provincial 
states, were free. Nay more, the people also were free and the Com- 
mons were born again. Yet though long since condemned by the uni- 
versal voice of Europe, though dismembered and past all hope of 
resuscitation, there was still enough vitality in the empire to make at 
least a show of authority. The pope of Rome had been its unwitting 
executioner, he was now its legatee, and as such he possessed suffi- 
cient resources to make a final struggle to revive it. This struggle 
did not come to a close until the reigns of Philip le Bel and Edward 
III. Boniface VIII. had written to Philip claiming him as "a sub- 
ject both in spirituals and temporals." To this, Philip had replied, 
" We give your Foolship to know that in temporals we are subject to 
no man. " ^ And with this contemptuous retort was blown out the last 
spark of Caesar's Empire. 

From this period commenced a New ^ra in the development of 
European liberty. Previously the movement against tyranny was di- 
rected both against the "emperor" and the pope and therefore was 
divided and weakened. It had now only to contend against the pope ; 
and the result was that it won many important victories. In the long 
series of oppressions and indignities which Britain had submitted to 

^ Brady, 11, 84. 



BIRTH OF THE INDEPENDENT MONARCHY. 355 

from Rome, not the least one appears to have been the statute Articuli 
cleri, made in 1316, which provided among other things that even 
where clerks, accused of theft, robbery or murder, made confession 
of their guilt before temporal judges, they should not be tried or con- 
demned by such judges, but only by judges appointed by the Church.^ 
The enactment of this statute revived the original causes of difference 
between the spiritual and temporal powers, whose joint authority was 
practically effective only when wielded by a single person; a principle 
which had been often illustrated under the Sacred Constitution, as 
modified by Diocletian, Constantine, and Theodosius. 

Another indignity, which, though of great antiquity, was now first 
so keenly felt in England as to excite general resentment, was the 
appointment of foreigners, chiefly Italians, to vacant benefices, and 
the diversion of their revenues to the uses of the papacy. Such resent- 
ment was strongly voiced in the remonstrance of Edward III., about 
1343, in which, among other matters, he represented, "That by these 
provisions and reservations (namely, the practice of the Sacred College 
to fill vacant benefices, etc. ,) the encouragements of religion were be- 
stowed upon unqualified and mercenary foreigners, who neither re- 
sided in the country nor understood its language, by which means the 
ends of the priesthood were not answered, his (Edward's) own sub- 
jects were discouraged from prosecuting their studies, the treasures 
of the kingdom were carried off by strangers, the jurisdiction of its 
courts was baffled by constant appeals to a foreign authority, and 
both the crown and private persons were deprived of their most Un- 
questionable Rights. These mischiefs are now become intolerable, 
and our own subjects in parliament have earnestly requested us to 
put a stop to them by som_e speedy and effectual remedy." * 

The ecclesiastical statute, Articuli cleri, was checkmated by the royal 
statute of Premunire, which made it a misdemeanour punishable with 
forfeiture and imprisonment, to appeal from the decisions of the King's 
courts to those of the pope ; whilst the Roman gift of benefices was 
met by the English statute of Provisions (135 1) which made it pun- 
ishable in the same manner to procure any such favours from the 
pontificate. It was not for nothing that Edward represented himself 
as standing upon a ship with a drawn sword. It meant that England 
was no longer a province, and that the only enemies she could now 
have, dwelt beyond the sea. In 1398 the wily pope, seizing a favour- 
able opportunity, sought to induce the king of England to repeal these 

^Coke's Institutes, part 2, p. 601, etc.; Henr}^ " Hist. Brit.," iv, ii, 49. 
*T. Walsingham, p. 161; Henry, "Hist. Brit.," iv, ii, 55. 



356 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

Statutes; but although the papal legate was received with respect and 
loaded with gifts, the statutes remained in force/ 

The origin of the Common Law of England is -usually assigned to 
the thirteenth century, with the reservation that "traces of it are to 
be found at earlier dates." Such indefiniteness bespeaks uncertainty. 
What is the common law of England, and has this expression always 
meant what it does now? We are told that the common law is the lex 
non scripta; but it can be asserted with confidence that at no time 
after the acceptance of Christianity and the restoration of Roman gov- 
ernment did the lex non scripta form any material part of the general 
law. Were the laws of Ethelbert leges non scriptae? Thanks to Lam- 
bard and Wilkins, we have them yet. The English reader will find 
find them in Dr. Henry's laboured collection. Were the Roman laws 
of Alfred, the Norse laws of Offa, the Danish laws of Canute, the 
ghostly Code of Edward Confessor, or the Institutes of Bracton, leges 
non scriptae? Next we are told it was the feudal or manorial laws; 
but this is denied by both Coke, Selden, and others, who contend that 
the feudal laws existed in England during the heptarchical period, 
and therefore before there was any general law of England, whether 
common or otherwise, an opinion concerning whose soundness it is 
hoped that the readers of this volume are now in a position to judge 
for themselves. Finally, we are told that it was the dicta of the bench ; 
but there was no bench, in the sense implied ; there were no national 
tribunals; there was no nation. During the heptarchy there were 
never less than three, sometimes seven or eight, different provincial 
codes of law enforced in England. The well-known diversity of 
moneys, weights, and measures, corroborates this opinion at once. 
Beneath these codes of law was a multitude of feudal customs, prac- 
tically of local or manorial jurisdiction, and above them all, the law 
of Rome. The bench was the earl's audience chamber, the thane's 
dining hall, the cell of some dark intriguant, who dwelt in Canter- 
bury, Winchester, St. Albans, or Rome. Alfred attempted to bring 
the heptarchical codes into one, and his compilation, modified in turn 
both by Edgar and Edward Confessor, was extant, in a written form, 
so late as the reign of Edward IV., when its vassalian admissions to 
Rome compelled it to be destroyed. It never was the law of England; 
it was the West Saxon, in other words, the papal or ecclesiastical view 
of what the law of England should be when the Norse chieftains were 
thoroughly subdued and the rebellious Norse seed was exterminated. 

The term common law was invented by the jurisconsults to mean 

* Henry, " Hist. Brit.," iv, ii, 79. 



BIRTH OF THE INDEPENDENT MONARCHY. 357 

something that, in the then state of public opinion, they dared not 
explain. At the present time the law is the law, common or uncom- 
mon, written or not written. There is but one authority and but one 
law. When there was more than one law, there was another authority 
besides the crown, and that authority was the Empire. Previous to 
Magna Charta the law of England was the Corpus Juris Civilis, as 
modified in the conflicts waged against it by the Anglo-Saxons and Nor- 
mans, whenever they clearly perceived its hierarchical bearing. Such 
modifications especially distinguish the Mercian and Danish laws. 
Illustrations of this antagonism will also be found in the changes to 
which Magna Charta itself was subjected during its various enact- 
ments and re-enactments; in the constitutions of Clarendon, 1164; 
and in the statutes of Mortmain, of Uses, etc. The basis of this an- 
tagonism was the mysterious common law. This law will be found 
neither in the Norse codes of retts, nor the codes of the Christian 
princes, nor in any similar compilation. These codes were mere cari- 
catures, not indeed of the Roman law, but of the Roman peculiarity 
of having any definite law at all. They acknowledged their own in- 
feriority and vanished, the moment they were ushered into the pres- 
ence of the majestic code of Rome. The common law to which we 
allude was never administered from any English bench, it was treas- 
ured up from the ancient Commonwealth of Rome, in the minds, in 
the spirit, of the Gothic people; it was not the result, but the origin 
of those medieval customs which aimed to preserve the liberties of 
the common people; it came not from hierarchical prescription, but 
from ancient memories, purified by the air of freedom, the spirit of 
the sea, the woods, the long march, and the clash of arms. That was 
the law which bade the Frankish soldiers to smash the vase of Clovis, 
and Harold, the English king, to offer the invader just six feet by two 
of the national soil. It was more than a law; it was a religion; the 
religion of the people. 

Beside this passionate love of liberty, and beside its bases, a sense 
of manhood and the pluck to maintain it against any odds — attributes 
of the Gothic races as strongly marked to-day as at any period of his- 
tory — there was no national law of England previous to the fourteenth 
century. The law of England was the law of Rome, and to admit this 
is what some jurisconsults indulge, what is now, a mere false pride in 
avoiding. Until the fourteenth century there were no acts of an Eng- 
lish legislature ; there was no such legislature. There were no general 
or national laws; there was no independent sovereignty. There were 
no mint-acts; the coinage was subject to the Empire. The written 



358 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

law of England consisted of ten centuries of Roman jurisprudence, 
piled on top of a barbarian code of retts, which had become so at- 
tenuated that only the faintest traces of it remained. That such was 
also the case at the same period both in France and Spain is a fact 
that furnishes strong corroborative testimony to the soundness of this 
opinion. The development of that august legislature which can not 
only make and repeal laws, but also create and depose sovereigns, and 
establish or alter the religion of a country, evinces a similar course; 
it began in the reign of Henry, it was completed in that of Edward. 
The first assemblage of knights and burgesses, the beginning of the 
House of Commons, took place in 1258; butasyetit was only a Council 
or parliament; its assent first became essential to the enactment of 
law in 1308 ; it elected its first presiding officer in 1377 ; it first deposed 
a monarch in 1399." The adoption of a distinctive national language 
belongs to the same sera. Although hybrid tongues, in which Gothic, 
Gaelic,Roman,andNorman-Frenchstruggledforascendency, had cent- 
uries before become the common speech of Britain, the language of 
literature, law, and religion, was still Roman.' In the reign of Henry 
III.,thisbegan to give way to Norman-French; in the reign of Edward 
III., it succumbed to English. The earliest instrument extant in this 
language is of the year 1343. It was not until 1362 (26 Edward III., c. 
15,) that English was required to be used in law pleadings.® 

In that distorted vision of the past, which, under the narcotic and 
bewildering influence of monkish history, has usurped an unmerited 
place in our beliefs, we are made to overlook, among other matters, 
the significant origin of the existing trade-guilds. The significance 
lies in the fact that they were all created about the thirteenth century. 
The creation of trade-guilds was eminently a sacerdotal function. 
Brahma, Numa, Julius Caesar, and, after him, all the Sacred emperors, 
created such guilds. The creation of a trade-guild by a provincial or 
vassal prince, for example, the king of England, was a sign that he 
had emancipated or attempted to emancipate himself from Imperial 
control. In common with his assumption of other imperial preroga- 
tives, it was a declaration of independence, and as such it possesses 
an importance which has not hitherto been recognized. It has been 

^ Coke; Hannay. In the celebrated case of the baron de Wahull, the crown lawyers 
denied his claim on the ground that there had been no summons to parliament. They 
might have gone further and denied that there had been any parliament at all, in the 
sense claimed. 

' Until the reign of Edward III., it was a capital offense to read the Scriptures in 
the English language; indeed the Roman law on that subject was not formally repealed 
until the fifteenth century. ^ " Seven Ages of England," p. 95. 



BIRTH OF THE INDEPENDENT MONARCHY. 359 

asserted that the London city companies have outlived their useful- 
ness. Be that as it may, they have not outlived their significance. 

Another of the great political signs which mark the birth of the 
English monarchy was the assumption by the crown of entire control 
over the precious metals. This was accomplished by various steps, 
the assertion of mines-royal, treasure-trove, coinage of gold, demon- 
etization of the imperial besant and other coins, ordinances concern- 
ing the movement of the metals, the suppression of episcopal and bar- 
onial mints, the trial of the pix, the regulation of the standard, and 
the doctrine of National Money. All these steps were accomplished 
at this period. 

Control, over such supplies as mining and commerce afford of th& 
material out of which money is to be made by the sovereign power is 
a necessary corrollary of the sovereign right to create money, and the 
two prerogatives will always be found hand in hand.^ The doctrine 
of mines-royal holds that all mines producing such materials belong 
of necessity to the crown. Down to the fall of the Sacred empire the 
only material out of which the princes of Europe could lawfully cre- 
ate money was silver; '" after that period such material or materials 
included gold. The earliest assertion of mines-royal, including gold 
as well as silver, by any Christian king, was made by Louis IX., of 
France. He was followed by Henry HL, who in 1263 asserted for the 
first time in England a similar doctrine and prerogative. But Henry, 
though in this, as well as ocher respects, he frequently assumed an at- 
titude of independent sovereignty, was easily bullied out of it by the 
effrontery and swagger of the pope; so that according to Matthew 
Paris, the independence of England was oft asserted and surrendered 
during his weak reign. The heroic example of Frederick II., in de- 
fying the impudent claims of the Vatican was thrown away upon this 
superstitious and faithless voluptuary, who saw his country again and 
again led captive to the foot of a foreign throne, rather than brave a 
single curse from the lips of a scheming pontiff. The prerogative of 
mines-royal was therefore practically abandoned until the period of 
the first issue of gold coins by Edward III. , when, without any formal- 
ity, it again came into force and has so remained with little change 
down to the present time. 

We have seen the prerogative of treasure-trove adopted, held, and 
subsequently relinquished, by the pagan sovereign pontiff, (Hadrian,) 

^ A proper adjustment of the rights of government to mines of the precious metals, 
both in England, France, Spain, and America, still awaits the dispassionate considera- 
tion of this great principle. On this subject, consult the author's " History of Money." 

'" With regard to copper, see elsewhere herein. 



360 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

who equitably divided it between property and discovery, and we have 
seen his right to deal with it fall into the hands of the proconsuls and 
feudal kings and other lords who ruled in his name. What disposition 
they made of it does not appear in the chronicles of the medieval 
ages, but we need no chronicle to inform us. The chance discovery 
of a hidden treasure was not like the opening or working of amine, 
a public and onerous enterprise, involving outlays of capital, the co- 
operation of numerous persons and the permission of the authorities. 
On the contrary, the finding of hidden treasure was of a secret and 
furtive character, and in the medieval ages troven treasure practically 
belonged to him who could keep it. The earliest public notice of the 
subject in England relates to the reign of Edward Confessor, who 
declared that all of the gold and one-half of all silver treasure-trove 
belonged of right to the king. It will be borne in mind that the Eng- 
land of this prince only embraced a portion of the present kingdom. 
We next hear of treasure-trove in the reign of Louis IX., of France, 
1226-70, who declared "Fortune d'or est au Roi; fortune d'argent 
est au baron," thus claiming gold treasure-trove for the crown and 
relinquishing silver to the nobles." 

The coinage of gold, first timidly attempted by Henry, then boldly 
and resolutely begun by Edward, has been sufficiently treated in other 
parts of this work. It is only necessary to repeat here that it now 
forms and has always formed practically the most striking, notorious 
and unequivocal assertion which it is possible to make of sovereign 
authority and power; and that its entire relinquishment and avoid- 
ance by the western Christian princes until the Fall of Constantino- 
ple, is to be accounted for on no other sufficient grounds than that 
the Basileus was universally conceded to be in certain respects the 
lawful successor of Constantine and therefore, as to such matters, the 
lawful suzerain of the Empire to which they owed fea.'ty. An inter- 
mediate step between the acts of Henry and Edward III., was taken 
by Edward I., who in 1291 or thereabouts, the date being uncertain, 
ordered that no foreign coins should be admitted into the kingdom, 
except such as might be in use by travellers and others for casual ex- 
penses, and as to these he provided public offices where they might 
be exchanged. This law evidently included and aimed at the besant, 
then the most important "foreign" coin in circulation, for with re- 
gard to other foreign coins, they appear to have been as numerous and 
as commonly employed in England after this enactment as before." 
The policy of regulating or attempting to regulate the import and 
" Etablissements, livre i, chapter xv. " Jacob, " Hist. Prec. Met.," p. 204. 



BIRTH OF THE INDEPENDENT MONARCHY. 361 

export movement of the precious metals, which we have seen from 
Cicero, Pliny and other authors, was pursued by the Roman state " 
both as it approached and after it had assumed the condition of an 
empire, was also first adopted by the king of England during the 
Plantagenet period. It is true that Mr. J. R. McCulloch was of opin- 
ion that this policy was pursued in England before the Norman con- 
quest, but as he has offered no proofs to support it and the coinage 
and other legislation respecting gold contradicts it, the author is com- 
pelled, though with reluctance, to differ, in this instance, from that 
distinguished economist.'* The same policy of regulating the move- 
ment of gold and silver, now erroneously known as the Mercantile 
System, was assumed by all the states that rose on the ruins of the 
Empire, but not until they had shaken off its claims to their allegiance. 
This sudden assumption of a regalian right implies a previous inter- 
val of over thirteen centuries, during which, save the Empire itself, 
there was no permanently independent sovereign state within the do- 
main of Christendom. 

Analogous to this regalian right was that of purging the kingdom 
of episcopal and baronial mints, with the view to concentrate the pre- 
rogative of providing an unital Measure of Value for the whole king- 
dom and placing it in the hands of the sovereign. That right was 
evidently attempted to be exercised by means of the Monetary Com- 
mission of 1293,(22 Edward I.,) which was appointed to examine the 
various coins employed throughout the kingdom and report upon the 
same to the king.'* Another assertion of regalian rights during this 
period was the Trial of the Fix, which is first specifically mentioned in 
the Exchequer-rolls, relating to the 9th or loth Edward I. , about 1280 
or 1281. 

The regulation of the standards of weight and fineness is necessa- 
rily connected with the prerogative of coinage. So long as the Sacred 
empire remained, the coinage prerogative of the Basileus — which the 
princes of Christendom had never presumed to violate — acted as a 
continual check upon any desire or tendency on their part to adulter- 
ate or lower the coinage. Anybody could balance a quarter-besant 
against a silver penny,and so settle out of hand the question of weight. 
That of fineness, though not susceptible of so satisfactory a solution, 
was almost as readily determinable with the aid of the touchstone. 
By these means, the tendency of the vassal princes of the empire to 

'^ At that period, for reasons which the readers of this work will understand, it was 
confined to gold. '* J. R. McCulloch, " PoHt. Econ.," p. 27. 

'° The text of the instructions to this commission is preserved in Madox's " History 
of the Exchequer," i, 293, note F. 



362 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

adulterate their silver coinage, was effectually defeated. That such 
was their desire and tendency and that they often attempted to in- 
dulge it, has been abundantly proved; and to rid themselves of the 
serious restraints which the ancient prerogatives of the Basileus im- 
posed upon their fiscal operations, they would probably have been glad 
to enlist in a dozen crusades instead of five. But whilst the Sacred and 
faineant empire actually lasted — and this it did so long as the pope 
hesitated to destroy it — the Christian princes had to return sooner or 
later to the ratio of value and the standard of weight and fineness im- 
posed upon them by its senile, but venerable authority. The moment 
the Empire fell, all restraint flew before the winds. The standards 
then and for the first time began to permanently vary ; and they con- 
tinued to vary until all sight of the originals was lost. Indeed nothing 
more curiously yet unerringly marks the emergence of the Christian 
princes from the position of vassals to that of independent monarchs, 
than the open, flagitious, and radical alteration, debasement, and degra- 
dation of the coinage, which began in all parts of Europe after the 
Fall of Constantinople, and which, unlike all previous alterations, 
parted entirely from the original Roman standards and never returned 
to them. 

In all its aspects Money is the most certain indication of sover- 
eignty, but in none of them so absolutely as in the practical and con- 
tinued assertion of the principle that " that is money which the State 
declares to be money." We have seen this principle asserted by the 
ancient Commonwealth, preserved by Paulus and enshrined forever 
in the Digest. It was practically observed and employed by every 
sovereign of the Empire, but, until the downfall of the Empire, by 
no other prince of Christendom. Then, like all the other preroga- 
tives left by the defunct Basileus, this one was assumed by the princes 
who had shaken off his ancient but dishonoured claims of suzerainty, 
and we first hear of it in England during the reign of Edward III.'* 

If we turn from the prerogatives of the Basileus to those of the 
Pope, to mark the end as we have already marked the beginning and 
progress of those practical assertions of sovereignty which constitute 
the Birth of the Independent Monarchy of England, we shall find it 
in 1366, the fortieth year of the glorious reign of Edward III. In 
that year it was ordered that Peter's-pence should no more be gath- 
ered in England, or paid to Rome." 

'^ Plowden's Com., 316; Polydore Vergil; Pari. Rolls, 21 Edward III., fol. 60; and 
the Mixt Moneys Case in " State Trials," 11, 114. 

" Cooper's Chronicle, fol. 245; Stowe, 461; Fabian's Chron. relating to 40 Edw.IIL, 
in Nicholson's " Hist. Lit."; Statute 25 Henry VIII., c. 21 (1533); Ruding, 11, 205. 



BIRTH OF THE INDEPENDENT MONARCHY. 3O3 

One of the earliest assertions of sovereign power on the part of the 
king of England consisted in an attempt to deprive the empire or the 
pontificate of the revenues which it derived from fairs. The statute 
of 13 Edward I., 1285 § 16, says: "And the king commandeth and 
forbiddeth that from henceforth neither fairs nor markets shall be 
kept in ehurch-yards. " '® In the statute pro moneta examinando, 22 
Edward I., (Rot. 3 b.,) they are still called by their ancient name, 
"nundinis feriis," and may have been held on the ninth day. Not- 
withstanding the statute of Edward I., the pontificate seems to have 
held on to this prerogative of the Caesars until the reign of Edward 
III., at which time the crown picked it up, to voluntarily relinquish 
it to the people in the following century; since which time the hold- 
ing of fairs has been free." 

Here we rest our case. 

It has been shown in the clearest manner that the lawful supremacy 
of the Sacred Empire is the guide to all modern history; that it was 
acknowledged in the Treaty of Seltz ; that it was implied by the Forgery 
of the Decretals, proved by the coinage, confirmed by the acquies- 
cence of all the Christian princes, corroborated by common belief, 
custom, and Holy Writ, and demonstrated by that sudden repudia- 
tion of vassalage and assertion of national independence on the part 
of the Christian states, which followed quick upon the dissolution of 
the Empire. 

The monarch of this empire had once been an incarnated god, a king 
of kings, a supreme arbiter of the world. From a god he had fallen 
to the rank of a demi-god and from that to a Basileus, or sacred sov- 
ereign-pontiff. In the ninth century this monarch of falling powers 
was fain to concede the temporal government of the western prov- 
inces of his empire to Chrrlemagne and his successors. In conceding 
to Charlemagne the spiritual government of these same provinces, 
the Basileus had demanded and obtained certain reservations of au- 
thority, which, if not all of them essential to the government of a 
state, were nevertheless of sufficient importance to mark the rank of 
the Basileus. He reserved in his title of Sacred sovereign something 
of what it implied, including the right to be regarded as the spiritual 
head of the Roman church, the right to altar the calendar, to appoint 
festivals, to bestow the title of patrician, duke, exarch, and king, to 
coin the sacred metal gold, and to fix the relative value of gold and 
silver throughout all the domains of Christendom, east or west. 

'^ Statutes at Large, Vol. i. 

'^ For income from Fairs, see Sinclair's ' Hist, of the Revenue." 



364 THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED. 

Down to the Fall of Constantinople no legal change was made in 
any of these arrangements, and in most of them no change at all. 
What the rois faineants had been to the maires du palais, what the 
mikado still remained to the shogun, so the Sacred sovereign remained 
to the princes of the west; a Reminiscence of the mythological past, 
a Leeal Fiction, a Sacred shadow: but a reminiscence that never left 
the mind, a fiction that exercised rights which no one presumed to 
question, a shadow that long darkened the earth and that is not yet 
wholly obliterated. 

But although these arrangements were not disturbed, the internal 
structure of the German empire between the ninth and thirteenth 
centuries underwent important modification. Barring his relations 
to the Eastern empire, the Treaty of Seltz had left Charlemagne an 
absolute sovereign. But upon his death the pope of Rome seized the 
spiritual empire, and to secure this, exerted all his power to keep the 
temporal one divided. Hence the wars of the Guelphs and Ghibelines. 

Notwithstanding this divorcement of the spiritual and temporal em- 
pires, their united authority, whether wielded altogether by, or sub- 
ject to, the "emperor " of Germany, or the pope of Rome, or divided 
between them, continued to be respected by the dukes or kings who 
now reigned over the various provinces of the distracted imperial 
state. Whatever the name of king now implies, it did not at that period 
practically mean an independent sovereign. The rulers of the Christ- 
ian states, whether known as vicars, dukes, or kings, were all vassals 
of the Roman empire; nay doubly vassals. In respect of certain at- 
tributes of supreme authority, they were vassals to the Basileus; in 
respect of all others they were vassals to Rome. Whilst not one of 
Christian rulers ever ventured, in more than a furtive way, to vio- 
late the prerogatives of the Basileus; whilst, until towards the end, 
they did not dare to brave the power of either "emperor" or pope, the 
rulers of the pagan states, whether Norse, Moorish, or Arabian, vio- 
lated and defied them all, and asserted in every conceivable manner 
their complete independence of Caesar's empire, spiritual and tem- 
poral, past or present, shadowy or real. 

In laying down these conclusions the author disclaims any intention 
to depreciate the elevating influences, or to doubt the sublime destiny, 
of Christianity. On the contrary, he has repeatedly declared his con- 
viction that through its singular capacity to continually renew itself, 
Christianity is destined to always remain the paramount religion of 
the civilized world. At the same time he refuses to accept the monkish 
account of its origin, or of the part it has played in the history of Rome 



BIRTH OF THE INDEPENDENT MONARCHY. 365 

and of the various states that have issued out of the Roman Empire. 
This account is plainly fabulous ; it does not agree with the pagan his- 
tories; it does not agree with the bronze and marble monuments of 
antiquity; it does not agree with the inscriptions and insignia which 
the Romans stamped upon their coins; it does not agree with chron- 
ology ; in short, it is at variance with every valid testimony which has 
been bequeathed to us by the past, it violates probability and insults 
common sense. 

It results from what has gone before that the peculiarity of our civ- 
ilization, the traits and tendencies which distinguish it from other 
civilizations, are due to the constituents of its composite origin ; chiefly, 
to two great elements, Roman and Gothic. We inherit mind from one, 
body from the other. If the brawn, the muscle, the personal courage, 
the elan, push, spirit, dash, enterprise, of the western nations, be- 
longed to the Franks, Hidalgos, Angles, Saxons and other Gothic 
races, their social institutes are by similar tokens the produce of 
Roman thought, of Roman experience, of Roman freedom, and of 
Roman law. The ancient Commonwealth of Rome no more existed 
in vain than did the Gothic tribes and the rude marks they inflicted 
upon the hierarchy. They both left an indelible imprint upon west- 
ern civilization; and while sophistry would waste effort in searching 
for the origin of our institutes in faint graffiti of remote Judea, the 
deep carvings of republican Rome and barbarous Gotland can be 
recognized at a glance, 

FINIS. 



367 



INDEX. 



Abd-el-Melik, 276, 281. 

Adrian {see Hadrian). 

Advowsons, 221. 

v^irarium, 123. 

^ras, 4, 37, 45, 147. 

Agrippa, M. Vipsanius, 53. 

Agrippa, K. of Judea, 35. 

Alaric I., 93, 171. 

Alexander the Great, 7, 9, 56, no. 

Alexius III., Basileus, 242. 

Alfonso, K. Castile, 259, 331. 

Ambassadors, foreign, 139, 232. 

America, 205. 

Antiochus, 14. 

Antipater, 63, go. 

Aries, city, 253. 

Arsaces, 17. 

Assemblage, right of, 116, 140, 218. 

Attorneys, 235. 

Augustals, gold coins, 251. 

Augustine of Hippo, 172. 

of Canterbury, 253, 

Augustines, 51. 

Augustus,sov.-pont. ,1,29, 38, 40,43,46,62, 

88, 98, 112, 148, 292. 
Aurelian, sov.-pont., 109. 

Bacchus, 6, 15, 
Badhr {see Buddha). 
Baku, oil wells of, 176. 
Banks and Bankers, 234. 
Baptism, 163. 

Basileus {see also Augustus), 195. 
Benedict VIII., pope, 241. 
Benefices, 85. 
Benevento, duchy, 188. 
Benjamin of Tudela, 244. 
Besant, or Bezant, 279. 
Blinding, the custom of, 193. 
Boadicea, 124. 
Brahma, 3, 207. 
Brahmo-Buddhism, 207. 
Britain, 253, 277, 282, 314, 347. 
Brumess, 30, 159, 190. 
Buckle, cited, 72. 
Buddha, Buddhism, 4, 207, 285. 
Byzantium {see Constantinople). 

Calendar, 2, 19,139,147,155,198,232,295. 
Caligula, 54, no. 
Canonization, in, 213. 



Canon law, 235. 

Carausius, 299. 

Caste, 58, 129, 226. 

Castles, 71. 

Catholics, 170. 

Celeres, 19. 

Censors, 218. 

Census, 119. 

Charlemagne, 90, 144, 183, igi, 204, 220, 

261. 
Charles the Bald, 271. 
Children's games, 160. 
Chilperic, 86. 
Chosroes, K. Persia, 199. 
Christianity, 143, 144, 164. 
Christmas {see Brumess), 159. 
Christnalas, coins, 290. 
Chronology, 2. 
Cicero, M. Tullius, 288. 
Civil Law, 235. 

Claudius, sov.-pont., 54, 55, 125. 
Clothaire, 256. 
Clovis, 65, 70, 173, 220, 255. 
Cohens, or cohanes, no. 
Coins; coinage systems; coinage rights; 

counterfeits; 127,225,269,275,280,282, 

314, 316, 337. 
Common Law, 356. 
Commons, House of, 103. 
Conscription, military, 219. 
Constantine, Chlorus, 83. 
Constantine I., 206, 223. 
Constantinople, Fall of, 246. 
Constantius, sov.-pont., 206. 
Consuls, 120, 218. 
Conveyances of land, 226. 
Corporations, 139, 233. 
Count, title of, 132. 
Crimen majestatis, 115, 217. 
Cross, symbol of the, 5, 24, 31, 1 10, 209. 
Cross-quarter days, 161. 
Crusades, 244. 
Curetes, lOi. 

Dandolo, Henry, 245. 
Darius, K. of Persia, 10. 
Deifications, 12, 
Demetrius Poliorcetes, 15. 
Desiderius, K. Lombardy, 183, 261. 
Dinar, gold coin, 278. 
Diocletian, sov.-pont., 223. 



368 



INDEX. 



Dionysius Exiguus, 149. 
Dirhem, silver coin, 181. 
Divine year, 5. 
Druses of Lebanon, 36. 
Duke, title of, 131, 227. 

Easter, 160. 

Eastern empire, 194, 244. 
Ecliptical cycle, 4, 34, 
Education, 118, 218. 
Edward Confessor, 264. 
Edward I., K. Eng., 269, 326, 

III., , 259, 326, 

Egfrid, K. Northumbria, 172. 
Elagabalus, sov.-pont., 55. 
Emphyteusis, 64, 97. 
Emperor-worship, i, 36, 56, 143,144,164, 

205, 208, 230. 
England, independent, 353. 
Ethelbert, K. Kent, 172. 
Excommunication, 116, 217. 

Fa-hian, 78. 

Fairs, 136, 229. 

Feoh, 69. 

Ferdinand of Castile, 257, 271. 

Festivals, origin of, 5. 

Feudal system, 58, 60, 77, 130, 164, 210,21 1. 

Fiefs, 181. 

Fisc (treasury), 123, 222. 

Fish-god, 161. 

Forgeries, 2, 224, 328, 337. 

Frankfort, Council of, 195. 

France, Franks, etc., 185, 198. 

Frederick II., 167,216,250,258,263,268, 

350. 
Free Cities, 136, 229. 

Genghis Khan, 241. 

Gold; gold coins, etc., 199, 251, 273. 

Goldsmiths, 327. 

Goths, 82, 169. 

Grass-eaters, 214. 

Gratian, sov.-pont., 85, 106. 

Great, an ecclesiastical title, 261. 

Greece, Greeks, etc., 194. 

Greek fire, 1 76. 

Gregory II., pope. 174. 

VII., 250. 

XIII., 15S. 

Guelf and Ghibelline, 249, 
Guilds {see Corporations), 139, 233. 
Guizot, cited, 70. 
Gunpowder, 176. 

Hadrian I., pope. 184. 
Hallam, cited, 62. 
Hansa (Hanseatic League), 139, 
Hardouin, Father, cited, 160. 
Haroun Al Raschid, 189, 232. 
Henry IV., emp., 204, 240. 



Henry I., K. Eng., 311. 

II., 265, 315. 

III., 259, 267, 347. 

Herod, K. Judea, 63, 90. 

Ilesus, 5, 24. 

Hierarchits, 28, 59. 

Hilaria, 159. 

Holy Roman Empire, 166, 

Holy Sepulchre, 242. 

Honorius, sov.-pont., 305. 

Houli(j-^i? Christmas andEaster,25, 30, 159. 

Huns; Hungary, 144. 

laku, gold coin, 324, 
Idolatry, 20, 247. 
les Chrishna, 4, 24, 57, 108. 
lesnu, or Vishnu, 3, 6, 28, 57. 
Images, worship of, 176, 195. 
Incarnations, 12, 19, 143. 
Infallibility, 115, 210, 217. 
Innocent III., pope, 242. 
Inquisition, 116, 217. 
Internments, monastic, 215. 
Investitures, 62. 
Isidore, Decretals of, 197, 201. 
Islam, 210. 

Janus Quirinus, 34, 44. 

Japan, Japanese, 79. 

Jayme, K. Aragon, 258. 

Jesus Christ, 149, 206, 280, 291. 

Jews, Judea, 90, 207, 221, 237, 288, 326. 

John Lackland, K. Eng., 266. 

Julian religion, 31. 

Julius Caesar, 26, 34, 63, 80, 155,283,289. 

Juridical systems, 117, 218. 

Jury trials, 231. 

Justinian I., sov.-pont. ,199,260,281, 294. 

II., sov.-pont., 280, 281, 294. 

King, or Knung, (rex.,) 254. 
Kissing the pontiff's foot, 17. 
Kumbh Fair, the, 138. 
Kaurzim, mines of, 280. 
Kremnitz, mines of, 280. 

Land tenures, 128, 226. 

Land grants to temples, 128. 

Law, doctors of, 234. 

Laws (j'^^Canon,Common,Civil,etc.), 333. 

Lawyers, 235. 

Leather moneys, 321. 

Legal-tender laws, 127, 225, 304, 

Legislatures, 117, 218. 

Leo III., sov.-pont., 176. 

Lepidus, pont.-max., 105. 

Literatures destroyed, 112, 193. 

Livius Drusus, 287. 

Lombardy, Lombardians, 185. 

Louis the Lion, K. Eng., 267. 

I., the Pious, emp., 201. 



INDEX. 



1^9 



Louis, II., Stammerer, emp., 95. 
Ludi Sseculares, 21. 

Maccabees, the, 288. 

Magna Charta, 232, 269, 322. 

Mahabharata, Wars, 3. 

Maharanee, the Great, 56. 

Mahomet, 177, 194. 

Maia, goddess, 7,15,25,101,108,159,208, 

291. 
Maravedi, gold coin, 281, 341. 
Marc Antony, 32. 
Mare, Consolato del, 233. 
Marius Gratidianus, 287. 
Marriage, 141. 
Martel, Charles, 86, 177. 
Martinmas, 161. 

Mass {see Nundine, Fairs, etc.,) 162. 
Maurice, sov.-pont., 174. 
Maximilian, emp., 260. 
Measure of Value, 361. 
Medieval (German) Empire, 166. 
Meiji, Japanese sera, 79. 
Mercantile System, 361. 
Messiahs, 3. 
Mexico, Mexicans, 79. 
Michaelmas, 161. 
Mikado, 79. 

Military service of ecclesiastics, 219. 
Mines, 126, 225, 278, 280, 293. 
Mines Royal, 126, 331, 359. 
Mints, 277, 332. 
Miracles, 47. 
Mixt Money Case, 301. 
Monachism, no. 213. 
Monetary Commissions, 361. 
Monetary Systems, 297, 362. 
Money, nature of, 127. 
Money, right to issue, 362. 
Monks (see Monachism). 
Montesquieu, cited, 76. 
Months, names of the, 32. 
Moslems, 168, 175, 
Municipal corruption, 205. 
Mysteries, religious, 21.0. 

Nara Sin, 5. 

Navigation Laws, 140, 233. 

Nebo Nazaru, 6. 151. 

Nero, sov.-pont,, 86, 124. 

New Year day, 44. 

Nicephorus, sov.-pont., 193. 

Nikios, John of, 162. 

Normandy; Normans, 239. 

Notaries, public, 140, 234. 

Numa Pompilius, 19. 

Nundine, or ninth day, 136, 161, 229. 

Offa, K. Mercia, 261, 302. 
Oleron, marine laws of, 233. 
Olympian games, 44, 150. 



Olympias, w. of Philip, 8, 11. 
Organs, musical, 182. 
Oriental trade, 6, 245, 288. 
Otto L, emp., 238, 263. 

III., emp., 216. 

IV., emp., 268. 

Ovid, cited, 38, 

Palgrave, Sir Francis, cited, 170. 

Pandects (see Civil Law). 

Parliaments (see Legislatures). 

Pausanias, 9. 

Pepin of Heristal, 177. 

Pepin the Short, 86,167,179,261,270,305. 

Peru; Peruvians, 79. 

Peter, St., church of, 191. 

Peter II., K. Aragon, 64. 

Peter's Pence, 223, 257, 260, 263. 

Petroleum, 176. 

Philip, K. Macedon, 8. 

Philip II., France, 269. 

IV., Le Bel, 337. 

Phocas, sov.-pont., 174. 

Pix, Trial of the, 361. 

Pizarro, Francisco, 252. 

Platina, cardinal, 265. 

Pollio, 42, 46. 

Pompey, 14. 

Pontifices, loi, 106, 212. 

Pope, origin of the title, 212. 

Pounds, shillings and pence, 295. 

Praetaxation, 217. 

Praetorian guards, 121. 

Precious metals, export of, 329, 340, 360. 

Prerogatives of state, 221, 236, 274, 314. 

Prester John, 241. 

Provinces, 135, 228. 

Ptolemy, K. Egypt, 14. 

Quiche-na, 5. 

Quirinus (see Janus and Romulus), 6. 

Ramtenkis, gold coins, 291. 

Ratio,silver to gold, 225, 244, 284,289,292. 

Ravenna, 178. 

Registers, public, of land titles, 128. 

Reliefs, 62. 

Religious animosity, 243. 

Revenues and Expenditures, 122, 221, 

Richard I., K. Eng., 25S, 265, 318. 

IL, 233. 

Robert Guiscard, 239. 
Robertson, historian^ cited, 67. 
Rois faineants, 179, 
Roman-British towns, 307. 
Roman laws, 279. 

money, 279. 

government, 307. 

provinces, 307. 

pontificate, loi. 

constitution, 99, 279. 



370 



INDEX. 



Rome scat, 223. 

Roncesvalles, battle of, 187. 

Royal prerogatives, 221, 236, 274, 314. 

Rupee, silver coin, 291. 

Sacred gold, 273. 

college of pontifices, loi, 212. 

Safe-deposites, Roman. 158. 

Saladin, caliph, 242. 

Salivahana, messiah, 7, 25. 

Sanctuaries. 112, 213. 

Soranus, Roman poet, 52. 

Saxon Looking Glass. 252. 

Schism, the Great, 200, 242. 

Scipio Africanus. 21. 

Scriptures, Sacred, 112, 196, 215. 

Scyphates, dished coins, 291. 

Seleucus, Epiphanes, 14. 

Seltz, Lost Treaty of, 192, 239, 251, 363, 

Sertorius, 23. 

Shilling; silver coin, 302. 

Sibylline scriptures, 112. 

Silver exports to Orient, 289. 

Slaves; slavery, 96, 133, 227. 

Solidus, gold coin, 189, 216. 

Standard of coins, 325, 361. 

Stephen, duke of Hungary, 257. 

K. England, 265, 312. 

Sterling, 327, 

Sterlings or pennies, 327, 330. 

Stubbs, bishop, cited, 74. 

Stylites, 214. 

Suabian Looking Glass, 252. 

Succession to the throne, 215. 

Suez Canal, 43, 143, 289. 

Sun-virorship, 159. 

Sylla, 22, 288. 

Table of Maravedis, 341. 

of earliest gold coins, 282. 



Taxes, 293. 

Tat (Buddha), 241. 

Temporal empire, 180, 

Temples, 146, 180. 

Ten months' year» 4, 33, 151, 162, 295. 

Thammuz, 6. 

Theodebert, 305. 

Theodoret, K. Provence, 92. 

Theodosius I., sov.-pont., 224. 

II., 86,145,305. 

Therapeuts, 213. 

Tiberius, sov.-pont., 32, 53, 107. 

Tithes, 107, 223. 

Titles of nobility, 128, 226. 

Titus Quinctius Flamininus, 22. 

Treasury officials r^" trade, 141, 

Treasure-Trove, 125, 225^ 359. 

Treaties, 138, 230. 

Treves, city, 253. 

Tribunitian power, 121. 

Valerian, sov.-pont., 109. 
Vassal kings, 308, 347. 
Venice, 241, 245. 

Bank of, 236. 

Virgin Mother, 10, 206, 293. 

War, right of, 130, 230. 

Weeks, and days of the, 137, 162. 

Weights and Measures, 142, 298, 324. 

Wilfrid, bishop, 172. 

William I., K. Eng., 159, 264, 311. 

Wills and Testaments, 128, 226. 

Woden (Odin), 209. 

Year, the, 151. 
Yule {see Houli), 159. 

Zodiac, 295, 



THE MIDDLE AGES REVISITED- 



371 



CORRIGENDA. 



p. 


L. 


3 


II 


7 


10 


51 


12 


97 


22 


102 


15 


136 


27 


137 


25 


139 


30 


143 


3 


147 


32 


161 


15 


162 


18 


168 


16 



For Messiah read Atig. Casar. 

For A'lessiah read Aug. Ccesar. 

For Augusine read Atigustitte. 

For «o^ read none. 

Strike out the word not 

For festivals read festival. 

For //if read //^^/r. 

For sodalitiis read sodalities. 

For Adams read Adain. 

For Adams read Adam. 

For Selcucus read Seleucus. 

For //ifw read //^aw. 

For Norsemen read Norseman. 



p. 

175 
197 
224 



L. 
19 

9 

18 



233 41 

261 29 

276 40 

294 39 



301 34 
306 10 
314 22 



For plentitude read plenitude. 

For undivisible read indivisible. 

After bequests insert therefore. 

Strike out /(7r //i^zV zwojA 

After Northumbria insert and. 

Marcellinus not Mercellinus. 

The first part of Note 56 relates 
to Theodoret, the second to 
Henry III., and the last to 
America. 

Before neither insert could. 

For 8 read 12. 

Before tamper insert oftett. 



APPENDICES. 



There are twenty-two Appendices to the present work, under the 
following titles: 



A Feudalism other than Roman. 

B Feudal Charters granted by Rome. 

C Bishop Stubbs on Feudalism. 

D Testament of Augustus Caesar. 

E Monastic Internments. 

F Falsification of Books and Monuments. 

G Origin of Antipathy to the Jews. 

H The Roman Pontifex Maximus. 

I The Mother of the Gods. 

J Ancient Images of the Madonna. 

K The Venus di Milo. 



L Astronomicon of Marcus Manilius. 

M Chronological /Eras and Cycles. 

N Vassalian Acts of Henry III. 

O Ancient Calendars. 

P Alterations of the Roman Calendar. 

Q Chinese Theogony. 

R Sun Worship of Elagabalus. 

S The Ludi Sseculares. 

T Chronology of Augustus. 

U Chronology of Christianity. 

V Chronology of Sylla. 



These Appendices furnish corroborative proofs and illustrations 
of the views advanced in the text. As such additional proofs will 
hardly be required by the general reader, and as to print them in the 
present work would double its cost, it has been determined to pub- 
lish them in a Supplementary volume, which can be obtained upon 
application to the Cambridge Encyclopedia Company, Post Office 
Box 2284, New York. 



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